Astraphobia
by Anthropedia
Summary: Keith had long since made his peace with this. But why did it have to happen now? And as it stands, Keith is the only one who is willing to accept that things are turning out this way. Keith/Lance relationship eventually. Story starts where Season One left off.
1. Chapter 1

To be honest, the crash wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. The moment they were flung out of the wormhole; Red had been able to lock onto a small, frozen, moon and safely land herself. Which was a godsend, seeing as Keith's hands had started shaking a little too much to be trusted with landing on ice of unknown thickness. Thankfully, the ice turned out to be thick enough to accommodate the lion without cracking, only leaving minor divots from the heat of the landing gear.

Once they had landed, it took Keith a solid seven minutes to catch his breath, which he might've figured was fair, after having been thrown haphazardly through the fabric of spacetime. Between the trembling of his hands and the shakiness of his breath, Keith found himself stuck, useless as his body took its sweet time calming down. Again. Red, however had immediately parked herself, activated her barrier, and started up her distress beacon in the time it took for Keith to regain control of his mutinous hands and breath.

In pain, exhausted, and pissed at the universe in its entirety, Keith allowed himself one small groan before he got to business running the diagnostic scan on Red to assess how much damage she had taken in the last battle. Once the blue flashing dot on his screen accompanied the red distress beacon, signaling the start of the scan, Keith leaned his head back and took the time to run his own diagnostic scan on himself.

He had been stupid. He couldn't deny that. He had been reckless and idiotic, thinking he could take on Zarkon by himself. Well, not that he was delusional enough to think he actually could have won the duel, but he just HAD to try anyway, didn't he? And now everyone was paying for it. Wherever they were.

And of course, now was when everything was deciding to start being ridiculous. Right when they were bringing the fight to Zarkon. Right when they were all starting to feel comfortable with each other. Right when Keith had begun to relax.

Whatever. It's not like he was particularly surprised. Such is life. He could figure out what to do about all that later. Checking himself over, aside from the slight ache of his joints and exhaustion in his muscles he was begrudgingly unsurprised to notice, Keith had sustained very little personal damage.

"So you can stop worrying about me. Got it? I am perfectly fine!" Keith mumbled in response to the low ebb of concern he had been feeling radiating through the cockpit from the moment he had lost control of Red in the wormhole.

Despite the slightest hint of a disgruntled growl informing Keith that Red did not consider his answer satisfactory; the sense of concern reverberating within his head died down to a much more tolerable level as Red focused all of her energy on the distress beacon and the diagnostic scan finished up.

"Well I'm afraid I'm gonna have to replace your LC-9 battery pack before we get you in the air for any real length of time again. There's a tear through the casing. Looks like that must have been what knocked you out back there. But for now, you should be just fine, Kitty." Keith spoke, his voice and words as warm and soft as the answering purr of appreciation he got from Red.

It was only a few hours or so after the scan had finished that Keith was about to try again on the helmet intercom. It was a pretty pointless exercise, considering the distress beacon's range was exponentially larger than the helmet intercom system. But he was tired and bored.

Which was why he nearly jumped out of his seat when he heard Allura's very concerned voice calling out to him, asking if he could hear her.

Or maybe it was because he had fallen asleep without realizing it; thus missing the castle picking up on Red's beacon, arriving at the little moon, and landing beside the lion. As well as all the other paladins coming outside to stare at Red who was apparently refusing to risk waking Keith up from his impromptu nap by allowing them inside.

"Oh! Sorry! Yes. Red's fine. Thanks for coming to get me, guys. I'm coming out now." Keith spoke into his microphone as he flipped his helmet to full coverage and scrambled to turn off the distress beacon still flashing on his screen.

The moment he was on the ground, Keith found himself at the center of a tangle of arms, hair, and shoulders as he was enveloped in a group hug.

"What were you even doing up there? Were you TRYING to make us panic with your 'Oh I'm Keith. I don't need anyone so I'm not going to respond when my TEAMMATES COME TO RESCUE ME!' ROUTINE?!" Yelled Lance, ruining the surprisingly sweet moment.

"Yeah, what were you doing up there, anyway?"

"You did have us a little worried."

"Your lion wouldn't even let us in!"

"I'm just glad you're okay." Each of the other's responded in their own way, their words jumbling together as they spoke on top of each other. Their voices varying from curiosity to relief.

"Yeah, sorry. I...was..napping?" The ridiculousness of what he was saying sunk in as he was speaking, causing Keith's answer to sound more like a question than he intended.

"Unbelieveable!" Lance's voice cracked. "First he tries to fight ZARKON alone, then gets thrown HALFWAY ACROSS THE STINKING UNIVERSE and Mr. Mullet over here is so cool he can't even be bothered to wait up for his rescuers." He mocked, air quotes and all.

To be honest, Keith was too surprised at the intensity of the reaction to be offended by anything Lance was saying to him. He certainly appreciated his fellow Paladins and the Altaens for coming to find him, but he was completely caught off guard by how upset everyone seemed to be.

He was just about to respond with some offhand snarky comment he hadn't come up with yet when the sky suddenly started pulsing. Everyone looked over toward the distant star, so far from this barren moon that it barely looked much bigger than the rest of the stars in the night sky. It no longer looked like the glowing, orangey red marble Keith had seen upon landing. Instead it seemed to be shrinking between pulses from red, through yellow, to blue, and back again so fast it might have been a strobe light at a rave.

There was zero time for the paladins to stand there, staring transfixed at the disco ball esque star before they each had a panicked Allura in their earpiece demanding they get back inside immediately.

Hunk was the first to take off running for the castle doors, followed closely by Lance and then Pidge. Keith had barely started moving forward (why did the castle suddenly seem so far away?) knowing that Shiro was waiting until Keith was ahead of him; when he felt himself being scooped up into Red's mouth. It wasn't his most graceful moment in the world, falling forward, arms flailing, feet kicking, as he was scooped from the slippery ice onto the metal floor of the cockpit. And of course, in her haste to grab Keith up, Red had also managed to pick up everyone else in the same gulp, therefore giving each of the others front row seats to Keith's sudden, one man dance party.

He didn't even bother to try standing up, or turning around to see the reactions of his fellow paladins as Red flew them all through the particle barrier and up to the castle doors. Without taking the time to land, Red spat them all through the open doors on her way up to her hanger.

Tumbling straight through the welcome hall and landing hard against the stairs, Keith had just enough time to turn back and see the distant sun disappear for an instant before turning into a firework as the doors sealed themselves shut behind them.

"Phew. That, my young friends, was a close one. Even by your standards." Coran's slightly too loud and exuberant voice crackled through their ear pieces. "No matter. You're all safe now. Up you pop and come meet us in the control room!" How that old man could sound giddy in just about any situation was beyond Keith.

"Okay." "Sure thing." "On our way." "Give us a sec." "Yes sir." They each mumbled in tandem as they tenderly stood up, thanking their lucky stars for the quality of their armor.

"Um. Not to sound weird or anything, but does anyone else feel like we just saw that star straight up die?" Hunk asked, looking curiously back toward the castle doors every so often as they all headed for the control room.

"Huh. A supernova? I wonder what this means for the castle?" Pidge piqued up by way of answering Hunk.

"I'm sure a civilization as accustomed to space travel as the Altaens are capable of handling anything a single star can throw at us." Assured Shiro as they reached the doors to the control room.

As if on cue, they all stopped their murmurs of agreement as a soft rumble began to blossom throughout the castle. They all managed to make it through the doors despite the rumble growing in volume and intensity until its violence was enough to vibrate the floors on it's way past the castle.

Keith stood as still as he could, trying to stay balanced as the quaking began to peak. It wasn't until it had almost stopped that he noticed the sensation of his right hand falling asleep. Looking to his right, he found the cause to be the death grip a pair of hands now had on his upper arm. Rather shocked at the sudden contact (what was with all the touchy-feely and grabby-grabby stuff today?) Keith's gaze just followed the adjoining arms up to the horrified face of Lance.

"What the HECK was that?! Lance demanded, his voice harsh and shrill. "Space thunder?!" He shrieked, grip only tightening as his eyes continued to grow in circumference as they darted around the room, looking for someone to blame.

Keith, along with the others it seemed, didn't quite know how to respond to the intensity of Lance's outburst.

"Nothing to be worried about, my boy!" Coran chirped, momentarily. "Just a bit of supernovatic turbulence. Nothing our little ol' particle barrier can't handle. Why, this castle has dealt with far bigger supernovas from a much closer distance than this one. There is no need to be alarmed. By my calculations, this moon here will be the perfect vantage point to wait out the initial radial energy surge. In fact, we are in for quite a treat! The view from within an active supernova is quite a spectacular one; and not one very many Earthlings have seen, I'm sure. Why I rememb..." The rest of Coran's sentence was drowned out by another wave of "space thunder" as Lance had put it, and Lance's own shriek of horror. Directly into Keith's ear.

"Would you cut it out already!" Keith shouted over the cacophony, ripping his arm out of Lance's grip, turning to face the boy, and stepping out of his reach in one swift motion.

"What's your problem anyway?" Keith continued, perplexed and puzzled by his comrade's behavior. Coran said it was safe, and the others were appeased. There was no need for hysterics. And yet here was Lance, throwing a tantrum over what basically amounted to a storm...oh...no way. Really?

"What are you, afraid of a little storm?" Keith, taunted, using the jab as an excuse to cross his arms, and throwing in a smirk for good measure. He was determined to shut Lance up, one way or another. The last thing he needed right now was to have people panicking. He had enough of his own shit to be worrying about.

Lance was apparently too caught up in what was happening outside to bother trying to cover up his momentary show of weakness. That is, until he looked at Keith, who was putting on his best show of judgemental amusement he could muster with the amount of energy he had left from the past 48 hours of nonstop chaos.

"No! Not completely! I mean, I love rain. Rain is fine. Rain doesn't kill you, destroy houses, bring down trees, break eardrums, or shatter windows. It's all the rest that's stupid and has no business existing! I'M NOT AFRAID! OKAY?" Lance blabbered. The last part losing any effectiveness it might have had when he yelped at the sudden crack of thunder in the very next breath.

"Now Lance." Started Allura, whose expression looked somewhat torn between amusement and compassion for the paladin on the verge of tears. "While I can assure you that Coran was right in saying we are perfectly safe within the castle and will continue to be so, even once the moon dissolves…" She paused when Lance and Hunk both gasped, but kept going before either of them could say anything.

"A healthy dose of fear is nothing to be ashamed of. In fact, once fear is mastered, it is one of the most important qualities a Voltron paladin can have, if they are to reach their full potential." She finished, her eyes on Keith.

Why did Keith get the feeling he was being reprimanded?

The insinuation that he might be better than Keith at something seemed to be an elixir for Lance's nerves, if his immediate switch from panicked pacing to smug sauntering was anything to go by. But, sensing Lance's next move before he made it, Keith turned on his heel and headed for the door. Keith did not have any intention of letting Lance lean on him, as off balance as he was feeling. Nor did he wish to have Lance's ever prying mind pick up on the slight quaking of his hands which were currently being held captive by the crooks of his elbows. This had been a long day, and Keith was rightfully exhausted. Keith figured he had every right to head to bed early, anyway.

"Keith. Before you go." Allura called after him. "Just so everyone is on the same page. It will be better for the ship if we stay on this moon as long as it is stable, so we aren't using all out power to counter the force of the nova pulses. This will probably take a couple days before it will be safe for us to continue. That does not mean that anyone of us is allowed to slack off. The Galra know what we are capable of, now and are surely already in the process of preparing new and more powerful ways to stop us and capture Voltron. This is not a vacation."

"Of course, Princess." Keith heard Shiro say amidst a chorus of groans and hums of acknowledgement. Keith himself just settled for a nod on his way out the door.

He was almost home free when another, somehow even louder clap of thunder shook the castle. Keith braced himself against the wall and waited for the accompanying shriek. Instead of a shriek, though, he heard Shiro's voice, in its best calming tone.

"Hey now, it's okay Lance. Hmm. Now it has been a while since we last had a fa- group dinner. Coran, Hunk, do you two think you could whip something up for us. I think we all might have a bit of catching up to do, anyway."

"That sounds good to me."

"Okay"

"What a wonderful idea."

"I could make you all another old favorite of mine!"

Great. So Keith wasn't going to bed any time soon.

He turned around to protest. He had a good excuse, he was tired and it's not like they were all separated for long enough to have much to catch up on.

But then he caught sight of Lance.

Instead of the shit eating grin, or the over-the-top horrified expression he was expecting, Lance was standing there, arms wrapped around his waist as if hugging himself, eyes squeezed shut, lower lip having all but disappeared from how hard he was biting it. And instead of adding his agreement like the others, he was just nodding.

In spite of himself, Keith felt a pang of concern. Lance must really be terrified.

And, Keith figured, he was kinda hungry.

"Alright." He heard himself agree.  
Once everyone was seated around the table and food was made, it took a while for everyone to start talking, what with Lance still subdued by the ever continuing thunder and everyone else stuffing their faces as if they hadn't eaten in months.

"I never thought I would miss having real meals like this so much!" Spoke Pidge, after a solid ten minutes of the sound of chewing. Hunk, whose mouth was too full to voice his opinion just nodded so enthusiastically, he nearly dropped his fork.

"What do you mean?" Keith asked. He was used to the overdramatics from Lance, and maybe Hunk. But Pidge? "We just had a huge meal a day or so ago, remember? Right before we attacked the Galra station."

The other's looked at him in shock.

"You mean to say, only a day has passed for you since we all got separated, Keith?" Allura asked him.

Uhm…

"Isn't that the case for everyone else? I'm pretty sure I wasn't asleep for very long…" Keith trailed off.

"Well, Allura. You said that Hunk and I had each been sent back in time. Maybe Keith was sent forward in time?" Pidge hypothesized, the intrigue of this new mystery outweighing their enjoyment of their meal.

"It is possible… And it would explain why it took so long to locate him." Allura's voice grew quiet as she contemplated it.

"That is true, princess. You can't find someone who doesn't exist yet!" Coran helpfully pointed out.

"Wait. What?" Keith interrupted. "How long has it been for you guys, then?!" He wasn't sure he was okay with this turn of events. Traveling through time? Really? To be fair it would explain some things...but no. That's just too weird. They made it VERY clear at the Garrison that time-travel was just not possible. He was so alarmed, he even said so.

"Well." Coran spoke up excitedly as the other paladins groaned. They apparently had already had this discussion. A few times by the look of it. "As I am sure you know, space and time are two parts of the same thing. We are both lifeforms that live more squarely within the space aspect. Which is why we can interact. As beings of the space aspect, when we make tears in reality, or wormholes, we are able to direct where-"

Pidge was having none of the lecture. "So basically we went back in time and Keith went forward in time because time was torn like space was to create the wormhole and when we fell out we fell randomly into both space and time. Makes enough sense. Though us all winding up within a month of each other is odd." They summarized.

"Er. Basically, yes. If you want to put it that way. Except not because-" Coran answered, obviously a little put off about not being able to finish his lecture.

But Keith had more important things to ask.

"Wait! A month! You still never told me how long I've been gone. And Pidge just said a whole month?" Why he was quite so upset about this, Keith wasn't sure.

"Well no. C'mon Keith. Keep with the program." Lance spoke for the first time this meal. His cocky self seeming to have returned.

"Pidge was talking about the time difference between when they wound up and when you wound up. Not how long it's been since the castle lost track of us!" He spoke in his fake-exasperated tone. As if it was obvious. And then, as if the thought just occurred to him, Lance smiled. That smile. The one that had started making Keith's blood boil simply because everything that came after it always pissed him off.

"Or maybe you didn't travel forward in time at all. Maybe you just snored for two whole weeks, sleeping beauty!"

As if sensing Keith's retort before he said it, Shiro came to the rescue.

"Cut it out you two. Yes Keith, it has been two weeks since the Galra base mission. Lance and I stayed within the same time period as the castle. Hunk wound up about a week back which meant it took a week for us to find him, from his perspective ("It was awful! Do you know how gross skinning your own alien meat is! Do not ever try that at home! I even ate...") and for Pidge it was two weeks ("I personally had a great time. I somehow wound up on that same planet Yello had been hidden! The sloth people remembered me and I got to try all of their deserts and let me tell you…"). From our perspective, however we found them within the hour. But it took us two weeks to locate you. We were getting worried. Glad you are back safe." He finished his summarization over Hunk and Pidge's excited retellings of their adventures.

Keith sat in silence for a bit. Just listening to the overlapping stories everyone was telling of the past month. That, actually made sense, Keith figured. Weird.

"Hey!" Lance suddenly piped up over the chatter. "You know what this means? This means I am now older and therefore wiser than Keith! HA!" Keith didn't think he had ever seen Lance so full of himself. And that was saying something. Lance was so excited, even the next clap of thunder didn't seem to phase him.

Never before had Keith been so pissed off that someone else's birthday was within a week of his.

"Yeah, bird brain. Like an extra week is going to do you any good. I could have been sent twenty years ahead and would have still come out wiser than you!" Why he always felt the need to retaliate against Lance, Keith would never know.

"Ugh. I'm beginning to miss the quiet of the past month, aren't you Coran?" Allura sighed loud enough for the whole table to hear.

"Aww come on, Allura. They're all just kids. They're happy to all be back together. They just don't realize it yet."

"Yes I guess you are probably right." Allura agreed with both a sigh and a smile.

Now that everyone had eaten, though, Keith figured it would finally be safe to escape to his room. His entire body was aching and he could no longer tell if his muscles were quivering on their own accord or from the thunder.

Keith forced a yawn out of his mouth. Which was immediately followed by another, genuine yawn.

"Well, as good as it is to be back and all, I am exhausted. Goodnight." Keith said, trying to sound like a normal human being who hadn't just recently time traveled."

Keith was being so careful. He even paused a moment after everyone nodded their acceptance (not that he cared) to gather his bearings. Even still, when he stood up and stepped around his chair, his legs momentarily gave out under his weight. It was only a split second. He only had time to grab the back of his chair for support before he was once again stable.

He immediately looked up to see if anyone noticed, but as he scanned the faces at the table, no one seemed to even be aware that Keith was still in the room. Until he locked eyes with Shiro's concerned, solemn face.

Keith refused to acknowledge his stumble and just walked out with as strong and relaxed of a gate as he could garner.

Keith did not like showing weakness.


	2. Chapter 2

Red Sky at Morning, Sailor's Take Warning: Part 1 (Lance POV)

It might have looked to Keith like Lance hadn't caught his stumble, but then again, everyone seemed to always underestimate just how much Lance could pay attention...when he wanted to. Though he would never admit why exactly he was paying attention to Keith. Anyway. Not only had Lance seen the near fall, but he had also caught the moment that had passed silently between Shiro and Keith.

It was weird behavior, for sure. But, then again this was Space Dad a la Cyborg and master of awkward yet apparently too-good-for-school Keith he was referring to. You can't get much weirder. Even if you didn't include the alien space robot lions and time travel. So, while Lance had seen what went down, he didn't think too much of it. Maybe he would file it away to use against Keith later.

Instead, Lance forced himself back into the conversations around him. As long as he was distracted, the storm outside wasn't too bad.

But that didn't last long. As great as his two best friends from Garrison were, they tended to wander off onto the most far fetched, over the top discussions about tech stuff. Which was cool, Lance guessed; but he much preferred actually using and mastering technology. He wasn't all that into the back end and building part. And currently, they seemed to be bouncing ideas back and forth about exactly how they could build a time machine.

Lance was just about to turn to Shiro to strike up a conversation with him when Shiro stood up. He gathered both his empty plate and the one Keith had left behind, depositing them in the dirty dishes chute before leaving as well.

Seeing that everyone else was busy (Coran and Allura were deep in discussion about just how long the moon would last. That was NOT a conversation Lance wanted to hear) Lance followed Shiro's lead and left to head to his own bunk. At least there, he could drown out the noise with his headphones.

Surprisingly, even though he couldn't have been more than thirty seconds behind Shiro, the other paladin was nowhere to be found in the hallway. Lance couldn't explain why it pissed him off (though maybe Hunk could. He's good like that) but it irked him that Shiro had just up and disappeared on him. He was fine walking alone, though. After all, the castle hadn't been that spooky since they fixed everything with that wonky crystal.

That was, until another round of thunder hit.

Lance knew. He really did know that it was safe, that there was no lightning with this thunder. But for whatever reason, he still couldn't bring himself to get over the volatile, hostile nature of the sound. Not to mention how this thunder shook the whole castle. Probably the whole moon, if Lance want to get real. And it left him feeling like he just got off of one of those weird exercise machines they made back in the nineteen fifties. The ones that vibrated people. Surprisingly, no one ever knew what he was referring to when he mentioned those. But he knows they're a thing as there is one, a relic of a century ago, collecting dust in his family's attic. His grandmother just couldn't throw it away. (It's an antique!) but everyone else in the family just tried to ignore it. Either way, when he was little, Lance had decided to see if it still worked while the adults were away. Long story short, it did. It was horrifying. To this day he had nightmares about it. The people of a century ago were wwweeeiirrrdd. And idiots.

And here he was, once again being vibrated to his core over and over. And this time brought along the sound of thunder. The absolute worst combination ever, in Lance's not so humble opinion.

Finally the roll of thunder passed and Lance was once again able to start walking. Though this time he didn't bother walking slowly. He took off as fast as he could down the hallway hoping to reach his room before the next thunder struck. He didn't even stop when he finally caught up with Shiro, apparently having decided to have an after dinner chat with Keith, as Shiro was standing there in the doorway, leaning against the frame.

"Come on, Keith. Just tell me-" Shiro stopped talking as Lance's pounding strides drew close.

Of course Lance had to at least glance at them as he passed, even if he had no intention of stopping. And sure enough, as Shiro turned to catch sight of Lance running by, Keith's face, looking more pissed off than Lance had ever seen him (which was saying something), was looking out and around Shiro's larger form.

Whatever. So they were having a moment. From the looks of it, Loner Boy wasn't having any of Space Dad's shit and vice versa. Not Lance's problem. As long as they didn't try to ask him why he was sprinting through the castle, he didn't really care what they were up to right this minute.

Lance had just managed to close the door behind him when the next clap of thunder sent him diving to his bed. Damn, he really just couldn't stand that noise.

As quickly as he could, Lance found his headphones and switched them to the most relaxing music available. He still wasn't sure how to use them. To be honest, he was rather hoping he could eventually figure out how to get Earth music on these things. But alien technology is weird and makes no sense.

Thankfully, the headphones seemed to be noise canceling. Not to mention that lying snugly in bed, the vibrations felt much more like those massage chairs and thus far more pleasant.

In fact, Lance managed to drift off to sleep before he was even aware of being tired.

And he slept like a baby.

Lance had hoped that he had heard Allura wrong and that the space thunder would be over by morning, like actual storms are. But instead, he was greeted with another roll of thunder the moment he woke up, although it was quieter and it didn't rattle him to his core this time around.

Ah well, Lance would just have to try and suck it up. Though he could already tell, with a start like that, today was going to be far less fun than yesterday.

He managed to get bathed and dressed with minimal falling over, though he still couldn't stop the automatic cringe every wave of thunder brought on. But at least today it wasn't panic inducing. Just unnerving and uncomfortable.

It wasn't until he was passing Keith's room that he remembered the scene he had interrupted the night before. What was it Shiro had said? Lance couldn't remember. All he could really recall was the expression on Keith's face. Lance found himself a little jealous. He wanted to know what could pull such a reaction out of the red paladin. Granted, Keith was the easiest person ever to piss off, and Lance considered himself an expert in such things. But Lance had never seen Keith quite that upset before. Lance was now determined to figure out what buttons Shiro was pressing. He could use whatever Shiro had said in his arsenal. Especially as he was currently looking for any and every distraction he could find.

With his new goal set, he walked into breakfast far more determined and confident than he had expected. Everyone in the room seemed to notice too, as he was greeted with an enthusiastic "Why good morning! You look like you slept well!" or some variation thereof from everyone. Minus Shiro who looked to have just been horribly insulted by his breakfast. At least according to the hurt expression he had as he stared deeply into its almost porridge like depths.

And Keith. Which was odd, as Keith, usually the first of them awake, was nowhere to be seen.

"Good morning all!" Lance greeted the room anyway.

Of course it was then that the thunder decided to make another appearance and he cringed against his will.

But he still couldn't resist making a jab at Keith while he wasn't here to defend himself.

"Oh look at that, does the mighty Keith need to catch up on his whole two week's worth of sleep or something? Or shall I just go wake his lazy self up?"

The others looked like they were about to either remind Lance of the number of times he's slept in, or speculate if maybe the time traveling had effected Keith's sleep.

But Shiro beat them to it.

"No!" Shiro's face showed that the harshness and volume of his voice had taken him by about as much surprise as everyone else in the room. So he quickly toned it down for the rest of his answer.

"I talked with Keith last night. Uh. He said he was going to sleep in. I'm sure he will be in shortly."

Shiro was also as uncomfortable to find that he had stood up to announce this, or at least that's what it looked like as he fumbled around behind him to find his chair and sit down again. He looked like he was about to go back to giving the porridge a guilt trip but speaking seemed to have finally woken him up a bit more.

"Anyway, Lance. We were just talking about the plan for today. As it's been a while since we have all been together to form Voltron, once Keith wakes up, that should be our first priority. Until then, the plan is to train individually until Keith joins us. Understood, team?" By the end of his speech, Shiro had managed to find his calming vibes and kind smile again.

As Lance was the only one who hadn't heard the plan before now, he was the only one to actually voice his agreement with the plan. The others just nodded.

But before doing anything, Lance was determined to get his breakfast in. There was no way he was training on an empty stomach.

Lance took his time wandering about the kitchen, trying to figure out which goo dish looked the tastiest today. He settled for the apparently offensive porridge stuff as it actually somewhat smelled like breakfast.

He also took his time with his space coffee substitute. As much as he just LOVED getting shocked by invisible walls and getting beaten up by little angry flying orbs, Lance figured he could try and give Keith as much time as possible to wake up and join them.

While Hunk and Pidge seemed to be on Lance's level here, by the time Lance sat down, Shiro was back to sulking at his porridge and Allura and Coran were nowhere to be seen. Probably already in the control room doing whatever they did when they weren't yelling at or helping the paladins.

But Lance's efforts were not in vain.

About halfway through his porridge (and Shiro a quarter of the way through his, finally seeming to figure out that it was edible) Keith stumbled in. Granted, he was all dressed and ready to go as usual but it looked more like this was due to having slept in his clothes, rather than because he had bothered to get dressed this morning.

Now was the moment he had been waiting for!

"Goooood morning there, Sleeping Beauty!" Lance said with as much sugar and singsong in his voice as he could muster. But when he wasn't dignified with a response, Lance added "Or should I call you Rip Van Winkle?" Lance was actually impressed with himself for that one. He would need to stock up on sleep related jokes if Keith was going to make a habit of sleeping in now.

But even this was only given a glare and a huff from Keith as he finally made his way past Shiro (who apparently had forgotten his food was edible again) toward the buffet.

Humph. Whatever. The day was still young. Though what was up with Keith? He looked like he hadn't slept a wink, as opposed to the 12 hours or whatever he had probably slept.

Once Keith was seated, Lance couldn't help but laugh. Having sat directly across from Shiro, Keith looked like a mirror image of the older paladin. Or maybe an alternate universe. One in which he was younger and pissed off at the porridge instead of insulted by it.

Since the two brooders were too caught up in their bowls to pay any attention to the outside world, Lance was able to wave the other two over to marvel at the sight of them. While neither seemed as amused as Lance, they at least proved his efforts worthwhile with chuckles of their own.

Unlike Shiro, however, Keith shoveled his porridge so fast, Lance wondered if he had tasted any of it.

"Hungry?" Lance asked him, actually curious.

"Not really, why?" were the first words out of Keith's mouth that morning.

"I don't think food goo has ever been eaten so fast in the history of gooey food." Lance reasoned.

"Oh." Was the beautifully lackluster response. Clearly there were far more important things on morning glory's mind.

As none of the other paladins had anything else to do before their Voltron practice, everyone resigned themselves to hanging out in the dining room until Shiro had made his way through his breakfast.

But it turned out they didn't have to wait long. No sooner had Keith finished his food, than Shiro dumped the remaining half of his into the chute.

It was so freaky. They were acting as each other's mirror image, yet they didn't so much as make eye contact.

And Lance wasn't the only one to notice. One glance toward Hunk and Pidge told him that.

Wasn't Voltron supposed to be made in part by their connections with each other? How was that supposed to work when two of the paladins couldn't even make eye contact?

These were the questions Lance pondered on his way to the hanger. But once he was in the cockpit and he heard Blue's welcoming purr, he put such thoughts aside.

It really was such a wonderful feeling, being in Blue. There was just something so welcoming and open about her presence in his head. She was always interested in what Lance had to say that day and always found his jokes funny. No matter what the others said. And there was just something so calming about her. A trait Lance valued to no end. Lance knew he could be a little over the top. Maybe not as over the top as Hunk. Maybe. But he could certainly let his excitement get the better of him sometimes. He just couldn't help it. In the heat of the moment, all common sense got thrown out the window and Lance always wound up running on pure nerve. Which, to be fair, was always a good thing, as far as Lance was concerned.

Once Lance and Blue were in the air and had found the others, they started the process of...combining? Voltron-ing? What exactly would the verb be for making Voltron? Lance would have to discuss that with Hunk later.

Except Lance's earlier concern proved to be right as two hours and five pissed off lions later, they still hadn't formed Voltron. It had been Hunk who had suggested they call it a day as the moon was beginning to quake and shudder even when there weren't any energy surges from the dying star tearing it apart.

It took a few more tries after Hunk's observation before everybody agreed and headed in.

As they were heading back, the topic turned from frustrated to philosophical as the others kept throwing theories about why they couldn't form Voltron back and forth. Lance, who thought the answer was obvious, was tempted several times to point it out; but decided he wanted to get to the bottom of this on his own before discussing it with everyone else. Clearly Keith and Shiro were both hiding something and Lance was determined to figure it out. No longer simply for the sake of knowing. Now he was getting pissed. Shiro was always the one saying they need to work together and tune into each other and act as a team. Not to mention Keith was always the one trying to force the others to keep going until things were perfect, at the expense of everyone's time and energy. Yet neither of them could be bothered to do anything about forming Voltron? Seriously?

Once everyone had gotten back into the castle and had gone their separate ways, Lance was on the hunt for the black and red paladins.

Keith was easier to find, as he was doing what he always did, heading to the training area.

"Keith" Lance called out. But like the asshole he was Keith apparently chose to ignore him.

"Keith!" Lance yelled louder, his walking pace turning to a jog.

When there was still no answer, Lance decided drastic methods were in order.

He sprinted the last leg to the doors Keith was heading towards, and, making himself as big as he could, and spreading his arms and legs in both directions, Lance was able to block the entrance.

"What the hell!" Keith snapped at him before wasting no time in trying to maneuver around Lance.

"Move, idiot." He grumbled when Lance moved to block him.

"Not until you tell me what the hell is going on with you and Shiro." Lance threw back at him, with only a little more whine to his voice than he had intended.

"Wha...Nothing! Quit prying! It's none of your business. Piss off! Go bother Allura or something. I'm busy." Keith returned, his yell turning to a grumble halfway through.

But Lance was a middle child. If there was one thing he didn't do, it was take a hint. And as a middle child, he was absolutely the wrong person to tell to "piss off".

In other words, he kinda snapped a little bit. His arms and legs returning to their natural position now that Keith had stopped trying to weave around him, his hands gestured wildly at the other boy as he talked.

"As if! It's your fault we couldn't form Voltron! It's absolutely my business! What the hell is going on? You always do this! You never tell anybody anything! You are so caught up in your little 'woe is me' and 'lone wolf' bullshit that you're willing to drag the whole team down with you before you ask for help? You always do this! It's that fight with Zarkon all over again. Didn't you learn anything? Or are you actually that stupid?! I know you think you're the biggest badass in the-"

Lance's speech was cut short as the wind was suddenly knocked out of him and he was thrown backwards onto the floor of the training area.

Keith, having shouldered him in the stomach didn't so much as dignify Lance with a look back as he walked in and growled out the command for the first round of dueling.

Shocked and fuming, Lance immediately got up and stalked out of the room with a single "Fine! Be that way!"

Once outside the doors, Lance paused a moment to catch his breath, not having waited until it returned before exiting the room.

How could he? Lance knew Keith was a loner nutcase, but even he hadn't expected the boy to be so...selfish.

But Lance remained undeterred. If Keith was going to be an ass, that left Shiro. And Shiro, he figured, had to be more reasonable. That was sort of his thing.

Lance was aware that his footsteps were a little louder than necessary as he stomped his way up and down the castle halls looking for Shiro, but he didn't care. Let everybody know he was on a mission, why not?

Shiro wasn't in his room, the gathering area, the dining room, the control room, or with Black.

In fact, Lance was beginning to run out of ideas when he decided to check the observation rooms at the top of the spires. Lance frequented them at night, due to their transparent walls and ceilings acting as 360 degree windows. Even if the stars weren't the same as on Earth, Lance still found it comforting when he could just bring a blanket and a pillow and lay down in the center of one and stargaze. The rooms themselves were tiny, they could probably fit a total of 3 people comfortably, and the highest point of their peaked ceilings was low enough that Lance could touch it if he reached up, but they were nice places. Lance had just never seen anyone else up there and so had assumed no one else had discovered them yet.

Shiro, apparently had thought the same thing as he was just sitting there, at the edge of the round room, cross legged, head leaning against the glass (or whatever material aliens used instead) in the second one Lance checked.

Pausing a moment to catch his breath before entering (scouring the entire castle AND climbing up and down two spires was more than enough of a workout for Lance. And the dull ache in his stomach from Keith's shoulder wasn't helping.) Lance allowed his anger to return from where it had settled during his hunt.

His entrance was sudden and loud as he rammed his hand against the doorframe.

"Okay!" Lance began. Voice harsh. Mind ready for another fight. "Enough is enough. What the fuck is wrong with you today? I know it was your fault we couldn't form Voltron so don't try and deny it. Something's going on between you and Keith and it's fucking all of us over. What the hell is wrong with you two?"

But Shiro didn't fight back. At first he didn't say anything. He hadn't even jumped at Lance's entrance. But unlike Keith's lack of response, Shiro's silence spoke not of indignance and closing off; but of disappointment and sadness.

For a fleeting moment, this angered Lance even more. He had come in here to fight and demand the answer Keith had so flat out refused him. Not be shut out again and subjected to another silence that got none of them anywhere.

But then the eyes in Shiro's reflection looked up at Lance.

And there were fresh tears in them.


	3. Chapter 3

Red Sky at Morning, Sailors Take Warning: Part 2 (Lance POV)

Shiro was...crying. Shiro doesn't cry. This was THE Takashi Shirogane, afterall. Lance's childhood hero. The leader of team Voltron. The idol of everyone who knew anything about spaceflight. The man who commanded the Kerberos mission. The man who got captured by the Galra. Spent a year as their hostage and escaped. Fought in gladiatorial combat and won. The whole universe called him Champion.

Shiro was crying.

Any semblance of anger that had filled Lance a moment ago was gone by the time he took his first step toward his friend.

Shiro didn't move or flinch away as Lance approached. His eyes just followed Lance as he walked the few paces across the room to sit beside Shiro.

Paying attention to the view for the first time, Lance couldn't help but sigh in spite of himself. The sky was like the northern lights on steroids. With the star itself on the opposite side of the planet, the sky was dark enough to allow every single color imaginable dance through it, as if in slow motion.

But there were more important things to do than drool over pretty lights.

"Hey." Lance started after a moment of steadying himself. Glad to hear that his voice had lost all harshness to it.

"You okay, Shiro?" Lance asked, purely as a means to start the conversation. Clearly, Shiro was not, in fact, okay.

Again, his question was met with silence. But one glance toward Shiro's face showed that he was having an internal war with himself, not ignoring Lance's question.

After a moment, though, Shiro's eyes closed as he released the breath he had been holding and allowed his shoulders to slump ever so slightly.

In this position, Shiro almost looked small.

"No. I'm not." He spoke, his soft voice surprisingly calm and dry for all the tears in his eyes and down his cheeks.

"I should be." He continued. "But I'm just not."

Eyes staying closed, Shiro took a deep breath as his expression went back to that of warring thoughts. Lance was about to urge him to continue when he finally opened his eyes to stare at some random point in the distance and his words poured out like a waterfall.

"I knew this was bound to happen. I should be okay with it. I should be prepared. But I'm not. I guess I had just hoped I wouldn't have to be there to watch it happen." Here Shiro paused just long enough to take a breath and release a small, dry, dark chuckle. "Maybe that's why I fought so hard to escape. I mean, that's exactly what The Garrison was. A boarding school with the promise of getting out into space? What better escape is there?"

Lance thought Shiro's rant was done, and was trying to figure out the least forceful way to ask what Shiro was even talking about, but once again, after a pause for breath, he continued.

"I just always assumed that, even if I couldn't escape, even if I had to watch it happen, I wouldn't have to be the adult in charge when it did. Yet now, here I am. Stuck out here, unable to run away this time…" At this Shiro's sobs finally broke through his voice.

Lance, used to comforting his siblings and friends, found himself rubbing small circles along Shiro's back. Which was a little awkward, considering who Shiro was, but whatever.

"I just... don't want to watch... my little brother... die!" Shiro finally explained, between sobs.

There was a momentary pause as a wave of shock ran through Lance's mind. Brother? Die ?

Had Shiro finally lost it? It was possible. The man had certainly gone through enough shit; it would make sense. But this was Shiro. The black lion wouldn't have chosen him if he was so near to losing it.

Resuming his circles across Shiro's back, Lance found himself unable to refrain from asking.

"Shiro" His voice had gone even softer. At this point it was barely above a whisper and was as gentle as Lance could possibly make it. "Who is your brother? How do you know he's going to die?" Lance paused as a thought occurred to him, before he switched gears and said " I'm sure he's just fine. He's probably safe and away from where the Galra can reach him. You don't have to watch anyone die. We're all safe here with Allura."

Maybe Shiro was having another one of his flashback things. Maybe he had gotten confused. Afterall, he had been in there with Pidge's brother, hadn't he? Maybe that's what was going on.

But by this point, Shiro had begun to regain control. His tears had stopped falling, though his eyes were still wet. And his shoulders were still shaking slightly, but no longer heaving from his sobs.

With a mighty sniff, Shiro sat up and smiled wryly at his reflection before shaking his head.

"Thanks, but no. That's not what I mean." He spoke, looking at Lance through their reflections.

Both hands now resting in his lap, Lance suddenly felt kind of stupid.

"Oh. Sorry. Then wha-" and then it all clicked. The previous few months flashed through Lance's mind. Snippets of mimicry and similarity suddenly stood out in his memory. Of course.

If Lance hadn't known better, he would have said Shiro looked scared in the momentary pause before Lance spoke again. All emotion having left his voice.

"You mean Keith."

Pause.

"Keith is your brother."

Shiro nodded.

"Why didn't you tell us?"

Shiro opened his mouth to answer but Lance beat him to the chase.

"WAIT! You said dying. What do you mean Keith is dying?!" And just like that, Lance felt panic rise from the pit of his stomach through his chest and into his throat.

All traces of humor having slipped from his face, Shiro sighed and rubbed his eyes tiredly.

Without looking at Lance, Shiro seemed to choose his next words very carefully. But not before mumbling something to himself that sounded kind of like "He's gonna kill me." as far as Lance could tell.

"Keith is my little brother." He started. Voice even. Very matter-of-fact. " We are seven and a half years apart. We didn't want to tell anyone because we didn't want to risk the group dynamic. I was afraid that if you all thought that I favored Keith or something like that, we wouldn't bond as a group as well. Keith didn't want to deal with the questions that would come up."

Shiro shifted so that his feet were flat on the floor, his arms resting against his knees, as he cleared his throat. Throughout his explanation, Shiro paused between each sentence as if he needed to reassure himself every time.

"There's this genetic...thing...that runs in our family. Not everybody gets it, and it sometimes skips generations. We didn't get tested until our cousin died from it when we were little. I was...what..about eleven or twelve at the time, so Keith would have been four or five. I came back clean. And. Keith did not." Shiro paused, as if telling this story was labor intensive and he needed a break.

Lance was about to ask him why this 'genetic thing' meant Keith was dying, when Shiro continued and Lance thought better of it.

"When we got the news, Mom and Dad kinda freaked out. Which is understandable, I guess. I mean, I get why. I was scared too. Once we found out, it kind of felt like Keith was a ticking time bomb. I did as much research as I could on his condition. I memorized all the signs so I would be prepared when they started. At least that was the idea. But in reality, I just wanted to get away from it. Don't get me wrong! It's not that I don't love my brother! I just...I never wanted to watch him waste away or be in pain or any of it. So when my test scores got me into The Garrison, I jumped on it. I mean, I had always been interested in space exploration. What kid isn't? But it's not like you're home all the time when you're at boarding school. And you can't get much more isolated from the real world than being in space. The plan backfired a little when I was teaching during the planning stages for the Kerberos mission and your class came up. On one hand, I really had missed seeing my brother. As great as coming home for the holidays was, it was nice to actually spend time with him and see that he was, in fact, still healthy. But I was suddenly forced back to constantly studying him every day. Then I was gone for that whole year and a half with the mission and the Galra and everything. Seeing Keith healthy when I got back was the first positive feeling I can remember since before the mission. The average lifespan for his condition goes from 15 to 20. So him having made it past that halfway point without so much as a single symptom made me think that maybe we were wrong and he would be fine. Stupid of me, I know. But I had hoped…" The tears were back in Shiro's eyes as he trailed off.

Lance was surprised to feel his own throat tightening up against the wave of information. This didn't sound at all like the Shiro Lance knew and looked up to. Shiro faced every challenge head on. His determination to do so even brought out that aspect in others. It just didn't make sense that Shiro would run from something like this. But then, did Lance even really know Shiro? They had been paladins of Voltron for only a few months now, and before that he had only known him as Shiro the living legend and Mr. Shirogane, his teacher. He could even remember taking Shiro's class at Garrison. With Keith, no doubt. And yet he hadn't noticed a thing.

But now…

"But now, Keith's showing the symptoms, right?" Lance asked, hearing his voice work around the lump in his throat.

Shiro just nodded at his own reflection, wiping tears away from the edges of his eyes.

About a million different snippets of all things related to Keith flashed through Lance's mind, without a single cohesive thought to show for it.

The silence dragged on a little bit, but Lance was only half aware of it as his mind twisted and turned in on itself.

Keith was sick and dying.

Both Shiro and Keith knew this might happen, yet came anyway. Not that they had much of a say in the matter, but still.

They knew all along.

And never said a thing.

Keith is sick.

Shiro and Keith are brothers.

Keith is dying.

"Does anyone else know?" Lance heard himself ask, almost to his own surprise.

"No. Keith doesn't want anyone to know." Shiro answered, before amending "Doesn't want anyone to worry."

This finally snapped Lance into action.

"Well, if what you're saying is true and Keith is showing symptoms, the others need to know! It's only fair! And maybe if the Alteans know, they can fix it!" Lance stood up with the intention of heading straight to Allura to tell her this instant, but his arm suddenly became a leash, holding in place, due to the hold Shiro now had on it.

"No way. I am not violating Keith's privacy like that." Shiro determined.

"But-"

"I agree, the others need to know, if for no other reason than Voltron hangs in the balance. But it is up to Keith. It's his body, afterall."

"Well, then c'mon!" Lance demanded. Using the grip Shiro had on his arm to unsuccessfully try to pull the larger paladin to his feet. "We need to have a talk with Keith! If we can't tell them, he has to! It's only right!"

Shiro, apparently more okay with this idea, nodded, slowly got to his feet, and followed Lance out of the room.

Unsurprisingly, they found Keith still going at it in the training area.

And they hadn't arrived a moment too soon.

From the doorway, Lance could see Keith, hunched over, sluggish in his movements, his body drenched with sweat more appropriate for a whole day's work in the sun instead of the hour or two since Lance had seen him.

Lance glanced at Shiro to see if he saw what Lance was seeing, and if the slight tightening of his eyes and lips was anything to go by, they were thinking the same thing.

They were just about halfway to Keith when his knees gave out on him and the red paladin dropped onto all fours, head bowed with a loud curse escaping his lips. Both Lance and Shiro launched into a run. Lance heading for Keith and Shiro heading for the robot now bearing down on him.

Keith didn't realize he wasn't alone until Lance's hurtling body made contact with him, sending the both of them a few feet to the right, as Shiro virtually grappled the robot to the ground.

"What the…" Keith panted between gasps for air. Continuing on with a "What do you think you're doing?" as he twisted out of Lance's reach.

"I could ask you the same thing!" Lance screeched. He wanted to launch into a full blown rant at the hard headed idiot before him, but his gut still remembered the shoulder that had been rammed squarely into it not an hour ago. And, the more rational side of his brain pointed out, Shiro was probably more equipped to handle his little brother than Lance was.

Thirty seconds later had the robot defeated, and the three of them sitting on the floor in a triangle.

Keith was looking back and forth between Shiro and Lance, with realization beginning to dawn on his face.

"You told him." Keith said, looking at Shiro, voice flat and sinister (despite of the breathlessness still lingering at its edges). It wasn't a question, but when Shiro hesitated, he added "Didn't you?"

Not wanting Shiro to be blamed for doing the right thing, Lance spoke up, catching Keith's attention, before Shiro had even figured out what to say.

"It's not his fault! When you wouldn't answer me, I went and found him." As Lance spoke, Keith's eyes flicked back to Shiro and his face softened from incredulity to an expression somewhere between worry and guilt that Lance hadn't seen on him before.

At this, Lance too looked to Shiro. He wasn't looking at either of them. Instead he was staring very intently at his left hand, as if it would give him the answers he was looking for. But as Lance watched he noticed the extra shimmer of tears in Shiro's eyes, wanting to escape down his cheeks but being held in check by sheer force of will.

Lance couldn't help it. He had to try and do something to lower the tension. He didn't know what else to do. Besides. It was his job.

"You know, I can be very persuasive." He said, letting his voice slide into a deeper, velvety tone. And of course he had to do the eyebrow wiggles with it. The effect just wouldn't be complete without the eyebrow wiggles.

And just as he had hoped, the other two groaned at him, tension leaving their faces ever so slightly as they rolled their eyes in perfect symmetry. How Lance had never noticed their similarities before, would always be a mystery.

"Sorry, I know this isn't what we need to talk about, but damn. You guys are nearly identical. How is it that no one has figured you two out yet? You even roll your eyes the same! Geeze"

And his goal was complete. Whether in embarrassment, befuddlement, or amusement, it didn't matter. After a quick glance at each other, they both smiled.

Finally out from under the suffocating awkwardness that was in the air, it seemed that Keith was now able to react to the situation.

At first he just sighed as he switched positions so his legs were crossed. He seemed unsure of what to do with his hands; but they quickly wound up in his lap, being thoroughly watched by his eyes.

"Okay. So. I guess, how much do you know? And what do you want me to do about it?" He asked after a moment, eyes not leaving his hands.

"Well. I know you two are brothers. Obviously. Though I think it's stupid that you two are so secretive about something like that." Lance started. Suddenly unsure of how exactly one says 'Well, I know you're dying.' in a nice way.

He decided to play the ditz. People love ditzes. Ditzes are hilarious.

"And he told me about that genetic...blood...thingy." To be fair, it's basically what Shiro had called it anyway. He hadn't told him the name of the condition.

"...Genetic. Blood. Thingy." Surprisingly, Keith's look of disbelief was leveled on Shiro, not Lance.

Shiro chuckled at the glare.

"Well, I wasn't going to sit there and tell him your life story now, was I?" Shiro defended himself, as his chuckles subsided.

"Yeah. Only the parts no one needs to know about!" Keith retorted.

Lance didn't know if they were only acting like brothers around him now that he knew or if he had really just been oblivious, but man. They were such brothers!

But more importantly, Keith was wrong.

"Except that's EXACTLY the kind of thing people need to know, Keith! That's why we're here! I mean, it's kind of a big deal! Especially if it's going to be an actual thing now! Maybe the Alteans can help! They have all of that weird alien medical stuff and who knows what those pod things can do!" Lance's brain finally caught up with his mouth and he shut himself up.

It wasn't really Lance's fault he was so talkative right now. He was running on adrenaline. He was terrified. And confused. And hurt. And angry. And so many other things. His brain just refused to wrap itself around the situation.

But he needed to remain calm. The last thing anybody in this castle needed was for Lance to have a meltdown. Especially considering the situation at hand. So he would just have to do his best and keep all his fears and emotions locked up as tight as he could. For now he just needed to pay attention to Keith.

Speaking of, Lance brought his focus back down to the conversation at hand.

At first, Keith was looking like he was going to argue, but once again, his eyes caught sight of Shiro and he switched gears.

"I...Look. I don't like talking about it….usually It's not that big of a deal. I already know what's going to happen, no one else needs to be worried about it." Shame and embarrassment quieted his voice. And the way he curled in on himself ever so slightly gave Lance the distinct impression of a little kid who was trying to avoid a parent's reprimand. A very odd look indeed on Keith.

Shiro seemed to notice the out of character body language as well, for when he spoke, it sounded as far from a reprimand as humanly possible (considering it was, indeed a reprimand).

"And I completely get that, but if you're really starting to show symptoms, and I know you are, then you know what that means. And now, it's not just you or our family to deal with. We have Voltron to worry about. Unfortunately, it matters for Voltron, and so it matters to everyone here."

"I know, I know. I just... Ughh." And suddenly, Lance was being stared at so intensely, he felt himself shrinking back as well.

"What?!"

"Don't go blabbering to everyone just yet, got it? I will tell them when I want to. Understand?" Keith's voice was so serious, and took on such authority, Lance was reminded of his time in The Garrison.

Figuring this was the best he was going to get out of Keith, and not one to miss any opportunity to poke fun at the red paladin, Lance immediately jumped up to stand at attention and yelled "Yessir!" in his best cadet voice.

Keith somehow managed to look both disgruntled and amused. Even lance had to admit it was impressive.

"You promise you will tell them soon, though, right?" Shiro asked, in a voice Lance could only assume was his big brother voice.

"I promise. Yeesh. You may find it hard to believe, and I know it's been a while, but I am not, in fact, 8 anymore." Keith grumbled at his older brother.

Seeming satisfied, Shiro checked his ticker and announced that if they hurried, no one would call them out for being late to dinner.

As they were walking, Lance, had a moment to think. He was still completely overwhelmed, terrified and in shock, but all things considered, he was pleased with how things were turning out. And pushing his luck, he decided to ask Keith something. To be fair, it was a simple, valid question.

So he turned on the spot to face the red paladin walking behind him, effectively stopping him in his tracks as well.

"So what is your genetic blood thingy called anyway?" Lance asked, crossing his fingers that the lighthearted mood was still going strong enough that he wouldn't get smacked for being so nosey.

With a world weary sigh, Keith stepped from side to side, trying to get around Lance and failing.

"Will you drop it and leave me alone if I tell you?" Keith asked, his annoyance not completely erasing the smirk still on his face.

"Absotutely!" Lance said, a little overly peppy.

"Abso- what now?"Keith asked before seeming to think better of it. "Never mind. I don't want to know."

As Lance expected, Keith tried to start walking again without answering Lance's question, but he held his ground and waited.

"Uggh!. You are so annoying sometimes! Do you know that?" Keith grumbled.

"Only sometimes?" Lance smiled, glad for all the opportunities to be silly Keith was presenting him. "My, what an improvement!"

This earned him a smirk from both brothers, as Shiro had stopped when he realized the others were no longer beside him.

Huh.

For a split second, Lance lost his train of thought.

Considering how little Keith smiles, he does have a nice one….wait what? Whatever.

"Whatever. Idiot. It's called Dysmorthemia. Happy?" Keith spoke, his 'whatever' in perfect sync with Lance's mental whatever.

"Very!" Lance affirmed, doing his best to commit the unfamiliar word to memory as he turned around and continued his trek to the dining room.

He didn't miss, however, the deep breath from directly behind him before he heard Keith's footsteps following him again.


	4. Chapter 4

Shiro POV

True to form, almost a week passed after Shiro and Lance had their talk with Keith and the boy still hadn't said anything to anyone. And really, Shiro couldn't blame him. Keith had spent his entire life avoiding the topic, afterall. But as the days passed, Shiro was beginning to get nervous. The last thing he wanted to do was go behind his brother's back, but he was beginning to think he would have to if something didn't change. Soon. At least, if Keith's now ever present symptoms had any say in the matter.

But at least things were seeming to even out once again within the group at large.

Thankfully, after that one disaster of an attempt, it got easier to form Voltron again. It was still more difficult to stay connected than they had grown used to, but at least something was working right.

Shiro would be lying if he said he wasn't feeling guilty about that.

Well, about everything, really.

Since Keith had confirmed his fears, Shiro had been feeling the same pull he always had. To GET AWAY. Which didn't help Voltron, and didn't help his friends, and didn't help Keith. It was a remnant of his childhood he had thought was conquered a long time ago. He was no longer the one who pushed to escape but who chose to stay and fight. He had made sure of it. Or so he had thought.

This was who he had person everyone knew they could rely on. This was the very thing that had kept him at The Garrison; teaching after graduation. This was one of the traits that had gotten him the Kerberos mission. This was what had allowed him to fight his way through the prison arena and stay alive until he could escape the Galra. This was what made him the black paladin of Voltron.

So why was he back to his old stumbling block? Now of all times?

These were the thoughts that swarmed Shiro's mind as he once again faced off against his favorite training exercise after lunch. He was lucky. The combat droid was relatively close to his own size and shape. It wasn't too hard to project his features onto the faceless head before him. After all, he was one of the few people in the universe who could say they have actually seen what they look like from the outside.

As he fought, he took stock of himself and came up short, once again.

One arm short.

Duck out of the way.

One year's memories short.

Feint to the right.

One capacity to be responsible short.

Side step left while turning toward the enemy's back.

And now he was going to be one brother short.

Dive in for the kill.

He didn't hear the door over the sound of clanging metal and the hum his activated arm sent thrumming through his body. But he did hear his little brother's voice when he spoke.

"Hey. Can we talk?"

The sound of Keith's boots on the hard floor, and the swish of fabric told Shiro that Keith wasn't going to bother waiting for an answer. And sure enough, in a few second's time, the two brothers were facing each other over the mangled body of the combat droid; Shiro on the floor, tangled with the metal, Keith standing, looking almost amused a couple feet away.

"Of course." Shiro consented, shaking his head to clear his thoughts as he separated himself from the wreckage.

They made their way to Shiro's quarters and, after a quick shower on Shiro's part, were both sitting on his bunk.

At first they didn't say anything. The chatter about the day which had carried them to the room had died down before Shiro's shower. If it were between two other people, it might have been an awkward silence. To be fair, it probably should have been. But when it came to them, these two who had years of awkward silences under their belts, it would take more than one lapse in conversation to make them uncomfortable.

So there they sat, each trying to decide what they were doing here, and if there was anything to say.

Well.

There was plenty to say. Years worth of unspoken fears and biases. Of memories and experiences. Of catching up in general. Since becoming paladins, there had certainly been a few opportunities for them to find quiet corners and catch up, but between the two of them, these rare occurrences had only yielded so much conversation. Until now, they had each just been growing comfortable with the constant presence of the other again.

Which had been fine.

Had been.

Finally, Keith seemed to tire of picking at the comforter on Shiro's bed. Taking a breath in, he glanced over to see that Shiro was indeed watching him before returning his eyes to the bed as he spoke.

"I'm not doing a good job of hiding it anymore." It wasn't a question, there was no uncertainty. Keith wasn't one to sugarcoat things. It had always been one of those reassuring, if not sometimes hurtful traits of his.

Shiro, on the other hand, certainly didn't mind a thin coat of sugar. Not enough to hide the truth, but he certainly believed that a spoonful of sugar really could help the medicine go down.

"It honestly hasn't been that bad. I think Lance and I are still the only two who have noticed. I'm impressed." It was true. The past week, Shiro was noticing every wince and hesitation during combat practice. He knew Lance was noticing the near constant, slight quiver of Keith's hands. Especially after battle. And all three of them had been locking eyes whenever Keith's legs, arms, or strength in general seemed to give out on him. But throughout all that, Keith was doing an impressive job of not letting his fatigue or frustration show. And, if anyone else was picking up on it, no one had said anything to Shiro.

"Well." Keith paused to give Shiro a doubtful smirk. "I hope you're right. But I will tell them tonight, anyway." His smirk disappearing as his lower lip caught between his front teeth, his hands wringing desperately at each other. Any assuredness he'd expressed before very quickly getting overshadowed by what looked to be fear.

"Really?" Shiro asked in spite of himself. Suddenly he was nervous for Keith. Even though this was exactly what needed to happen.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah." The determination in Keith's eyes solidified the rest of his face into a resigned pout. His still-frantic hands the only remaining indication of nervousness.

"Coran is making us have one of those bonding nights again." Keith continued after clearing his throat, either unable to or not trying to hide his disdain for the exercise.

"Hey, those are useful. And you know it." Shiro defended. "Besides, they're starting to be fun. I think he and Allura have realized that games and the like are working better than the meditations."

Keith rolled his eyes but nodded his agreement.

"Anyway. I figure tonight, at the end when we do the telepathic progress assessment, I'll inform everyone."

Keith didn't say how exactly he would inform everyone, so Shiro was left to assume Keith would mentally bring it out to the open during the exercise. Which was a little sudden and extreme, and probably wouldn't go over well. But after thinking about it for a bit, Shiro figured this would probably be the best route. Afterall, Keith's blunt way of talking about things wasn't exactly everyone's cup of tea.

"I think that's a wise idea." Shiro agreed, finally.

Instead of responding, Keith's shoulders just slumped ever so slightly. What hair was long enough to be caught by his shoulders falling forward, slightly covering his face. The movement made him look younger; reminding Shiro of when Keith had first decided to let his hair grow out, much to the disdain of their mom.

Shiro wanted to ask what Keith was specifically scared would happen. He wanted his brother to trust him with his fears. But Shiro also understood that Keith just didn't do that. Not yet anyway. Shiro trusted Keith enough to know that when the time came and he was ready, Keith would open up. He always did...Eventually.

After a few more minutes of slightly more awkward silence, Keith left, presumably to take his turn in training while he still had time before dinner. Shiro was tempted to follow him, not wanting Keith to overexert himself. But the last thing Keith needed was to be smothered. He was going to get too much of that soon enough. Besides. He had been doing a lot better about that since their talk with Lance. Shiro figured almost collapsing in front of Lance was embarrassing enough to slightly curb Keith's need to constantly push his limits.

So instead, Shiro took a quick nap before heading to the lounge, where the others were no doubt hanging out.

"Dysmorthmm...Wait. What? No..." Lance's too loud mumblings greeted Shiro as he walked in. There was a split second where Shiro thought Lance was going back on their agreement and was telling the others about Keith's Dysmorthemia. But as his eyes caught up with his ears, he saw Lance huddled in a ball on the couch, headphones in, eyebrows drawn tight together as he poked and swiped at the tablet lying propped up against his pulled up legs.

Shiro was kind of surprised to realize what Lance was doing. It was actually almost comforting to see Lance researching. But by the bemused looks of the other two paladins in the room, he was the only one comfortable with the sight.

"Do you see what I see?" Hunk was asking Pidge, not taking his eyes off Lance's concentrating form.

"Uh-huh." Pidge responded, adjusting their glasses for a better view. "It looks like Lance is...studying?"

"That's what I thought. Do you ever remember seeing him do that at the..hey! What are you doing!?" Hunk demanded, his voice going from curious to anxious in 0.5 seconds flat.

Pidge was, in fact, climbing carefully up and around the back of the couch, so as to sneak directly behind Lance.

It was an awkward instant when Shiro realized a moment too late that Pidge was now in the perfect position to read over Lance's shoulder. But Pidge seemed to have other plans. With a wink toward Hunk; Pidge hovered their hands around Lance's headphones for only a split second before carefully clenching their fingers around the speakers and leaning in close.

"YOU COME UP HERE TO ROCK OUT?!" Pidge screamed into Lance's ear, sending the headphones bouncing onto the sofa as they did so.

What?

A string of what might have been profanities (if every other word wasn't some sort of food or dance move) erupted from Lance at such high a high pitch and volume, Shiro had to fight not to wince. Lance however, curled in on himself as if trying to use his body to protect a precious treasure.

"WHAT WAS THAT FOR?" Lance screeched, wide eyes a mixture of fear and anger.

Both Hunk and Pidge were doubled over with laughter, but Pidge managed a quiet "Payback" between gasping breaths.

Shiro quickly came to the conclusion that he didn't want to know what Pidge meant, so he just calmly walked over to Lance, moved the wayward headphones, and sat down beside the blue paladin.

By the time Hunk and Pidge had calmed themselves down enough to converse, Lance had given up glaring at them in favor of going back to his studying, though this time sans headphones.

"No but seriously, are you studying? I haven't seen you make that face since the last time I had to remind you of a test the next day." Hunk asked.

"Yeah! So what? It's been known to happen!" Lance squaked defensively.

"Since when?" Pidge countered. "What are you even looking at anyway?"

With a quick glance toward Shiro that the others clearly noticed, Lance was obviously needing help to come up with an answer when Allura and Coran came bursting in, eyes wild with concern.

"What is it? Is everybody alright?" Allura questioned the moment the doors opened.

"Why it sounded like one of you caught your first whiff of a Zaltrolop fungus!" Coran added, with equal fervor.

"Everything's fine. Lance's just a wimp." Pidge said, all hints of their previous humor suspiciously absent from their now flatlined face and voice.

"Ugh. Lance!" Allura groaned, her face flashing from fear to annoyance to amusement.

"Hey! It's not MY fault! They're the crazy ones!" Lance defended.

Coran and Shiro both chuckled at Lance's reaction as the door opened and Keith walked in.

Shiro's breath immediately caught in his throat at the sight of Keith, and from the stiffening of Lance's posture, he could tell they were on the same page.

Keith was actually smiling as he walked in, his hair damp from a shower, and arms back in their crossed position he had become such a huge fan of recently. But despite his happy demeanor, his face was paler and he looked more exhausted than could be at all healthy.

As he locked eyes with Shiro and Lance, for an instant his smile wavered ever so slightly, but he still pressed on.

"Okay, what happened? I could hear Lance's screaming from my room."

"Nothing! Nothing happened, okay!?" Lance demanded, his voice loud and turning to a whine as red flared on his cheeks in response to Keith's smirk. "Pidge and Hunk are just jerks. Never turn your back on them. They will take any opportunity to attack you while your defenses are down." He continued, eyes darting around, looking like he was unsure whether to be embarrassed or peeved.

Hunk snickered at this while Pidge mumbled under their breath "This is a fair point. A valid argument."

Keith just shook his head and sat down on Shiro's other side, making Shiro shirk away ever so slightly. To his alarm, contrary to Keith's steady voice and confident expression, his whole body was trembling as if attempting to hold up a painfully heavy weight.

Shiro's unconscious movement did not go unnoticed by either paladin beside him. Keith's expression soured as he scooted further away from Shiro and Lance leaned forward to better look around Shiro to Keith.

Shame flooded the black paladin. He hadn't meant to flinch away from his brother. He immediately leaned over to Keith, swinging his arm around Keith's shoulders, ignoring both his quaking shiver and clear discomfort at the gesture. Lance just gave a nervous chuckle.

Everyone else in the room had stopped their banter and were just looking at the three of them.

"What? Is something wrong?" Shiro asked, knowing full well that nothing about this exchange had been normal behavior.

"I was about to ask you the same question." Allura responded, but thankfully, Pidge came to the unknowing rescue.

"Eeh they're just weird. And Shiro does that. I remember when we would have him over for dinner before the mission, he always had his arm over or on Matt and dad's shoulders..." their voice trailing off as they reminisced.

And they were right. Shiro too was momentarily struck by the flood of happy memories of dinners at the Holt's during the planning stages of the mission.

The silence turned somber as no one ever seemed to know what to say when Pidge's family came up in conversation.

But then Coran jumped about ten feet in the air, whooping like his team had just won the big event.

"I found them! Allura, I found them! The castle's database DID save them this whole time!"

Allura's face went from sombre to giddy excitement faster than Shiro had thought possible.

"Oh really, Coran? That's just wonderful! Alright Paladins! We will be having dinner in here tonight! Coran and I have located the old Infogoffes!"

"Infogoffes?" Pidge asked, curiosity piqued.

"Yes! Infogoffes are moving pictures set to verbal audio stimuli that explains the Altean history, culture, and mission. There is even one about Voltron from when it was new!"

"You mean documentaries?" Pidge asked. But had to explain themselves. "Educational videos to teach people about history, science, technology, and culture. To document society, if you will." Pidge countered, clearly interested.

"Documentaries? Hm. Well, I guess you could say so. You will have to show me one of your earth documentaries sometime."

Looking at Allura, Shiro was surprised by the sight of the budding tears in her eyes. But they were happy tears. Of course this would be emotional for her. She missed Altea so much, and here she was about to watch documentaries showcasing her people and home.

"Alright, how do we watch them?" Shiro asked. He wasn't going to bring up the probable language barrier. He still didn't understand how they were even able to understand the Alteans or any of the other species they had met, for that matter. Overheard discussions between Allura and Hunk suggested the theory of their quintessence as paladins having to do with it but now wasn't the time to re-open that can of worms.

"We will project them into this room! Like this!" Coran answered, and with a flick of his finger across his tablet, the white walls and floor of the room around them disappeared and they were suddenly at the center of a panoramic video.

Everyone gasped. They were looking up at the Castle of Lions, gleaming orange in the light of a setting sun, at the top of a city on a hill. The city was also a pearly white, reflecting the orange glow of the sunset, full of spires and arches, with pods flying here and there. At the top of the five highest spires were triangular flags waving lazily in the wind, one blue, one yellow, one red, one green, and one black. The still blue sky was decorated with perfectly smooth, fast moving clouds. Instead of the puffy or wispy clouds on earth, these clouds actually looked like they were made of liquid; flowing into each other in streams directed by the wind.

As Shiro looked around, mouth agape, his gaze followed the main road down the hill until it looked like it should pass directly under them, as if they were standing directly on it. But the entire couch area was pitch black. Even looking down his own body, Shiro could only see down to just below his shoulders before his body was engulfed by black. Well, that was one way to be immersive.

It was when he looked down and his mind was brought back to reality that Shiro first noticed Keith's quivering had amped up since he had sat down. Instead of feeling like shivers, the tremors in Keith's body felt more like quakes. Looking over at Keith, Shiro saw his brother already watching him nervously. Shiro was about to ask if Keith needed help, but Keith just shook his head, his eyes warning Shiro not to draw attention to it. So Shiro just nodded, pulling his arm tighter around his brother in the hopes of supporting him, and continued to look around.

Behind them all, the hill turned into a gentle slope filled with green grass and miniature trees that looked fully grown; even though they couldn't have reached past Shiro's hip at best. The landscape around them was dotted by pink and purple flowers. With mountains rising to snowy peaks to Shiro's left and the rolling hills falling gradually to a crystal blue ocean, a strip of black sand bordering it, on his right. It really was quite a breathtaking sight to behold. If it didn't look so real, Shiro would have never thought such a place could exist.

Allura was talking 100 miles an hour to Pidge pointing at every building in sight. Coran on the other hand was looking rather perplexed.

"Hm. It seems the sound isn't working properly. There should be music at this point. Ah well, these are ancient, afterall. Let me see what I can do." And with that, Coran brought up a screen in front of him and started typing away.

"Well, if it's going to be a bit, I'm gonna go whip up some grub." Hunk announced, carefully toeing his way out of the circular couch, apparently finding it difficult to walk without being able to see past his stomach.

Looking around, everyone was in awe of the beauty of the landscape before them. Lance was just staring at the beach, watching the sparkling waves against the black sand. Coran kept getting distracted from his screen to smile at the little dragon/bird creatures soaring through the sky. Allura and Pidge had fallen silent as they took in the city's-

Keith's body convulsed as a throaty grunt escaped his lips. Shiro's head jerked to his left to see Keith's eyes squeezed shut, head tilted harshly to the right, his mouth open in a cringe.

And it didn't stop, Keith's body spasmed, almost out of Shiro's grasp. Every muscle in his body clenching against its neighboring muscles without rhythm or pattern.

With each spasm, Keith whimpered, obviously in serious pain, any control over his body non existent.

Shiro could practically hear the horror and panic rise in his body as he forgot every other thing in the room and launched himself into action.

Shiro heard his own voice call out for the lights as he maneuvered himself around Keith's body and brought the both of them to the floor in the center of the couch.

By the time the lights were back on, Shiro was kneeling on the floor with Keith's head in his lap as his brother's body appeared to tear itself apart. Faster and faster the convulsions came until they blended into each other and Keith was a quivering mass of clenched muscles and twisted, curled limbs.

"Shh. Shhh. It's okay Keith. Just hold on, buddy." Shiro murmured, his left hand stroking his little brother's forehead of it's own accord. Vaguely, Keith heard the sound of Lance making a choking noise.

It was then that Shiro's mind caught up with the situation upon being reminded of the other people in the room. Snapping his head up, he took stock of those around him.

The first face he saw was Lance's. His face was frozen in horror. The only movement in his entire body was his unhealthily fast, panicked breathing and the tears beginning to spill onto his cheeks.

Coran who had been the one to turn the lights back on, was watching on with an equally balanced mixture of concern and curiosity.

Pidge's face almost mirrored Lance's, replacing the tears with just straight up shock. They had backed up against the wall, as if trying to avoid the scene their eyes were glued to.

Allura was walking closer, looking completely confused as if watching an impossibility unfold.

Hunk was just walking in behind Shiro, so he couldn't see him, but he could hear as Hunk set down the platters of food he was carrying, and he started to talk.

"Alright guys so you won't believe this but I was able to make NACHOOOO- Oh shit! KEITH! Okay. Everyone breathe it's okay. He's just having a seizure, he will come out of it soon. Pidge don't freak out, he isn't a malfunctioning robot, he'll be fine, I promise. Allura and Coran, please stay back, he might kick you if you get to close. Just give him some breathing space. Lance breathe. It's going to be okay."

At this point, everyone had turned to stare blankly at Hunk, aside from Shiro, whose eyes went back down to Keith's quaking, convulsing, whimpering form. Then Shiro felt a hand on his back as Hunk spoke, his voice gentle and calming.

"Shiro and Keith you are both doing wonderfully. You can do this. Just stay calm. You know what I bet you could use right now, Keith? I bet you could really use a cool washcloth. He is probably overheating from the exertion and sweating to boot. I'm going to go find him a cool washcloth. Anyone know where I can find a clean washcloth?"

Coran, with a triumphant exclamation came running over, brandishing a handkerchief at Hunk, somehow tickling Shiro's ear in the process.

"Thanks, man." Hunk spoke quickly as he stood up and walked over to one of the cups of water he'd brought with the food, dunking the cloth in and grabbing one of the ice cubes.

After wringing it out, he wrapped the ice cube in the handkerchief and came back over, not reacting when Keith's hand accidentally smacked against his leg.

"Here Shiro." Hunk spoke with a reassuring smile to Shiro who silently took the cloth and placed it against Keith's forehead, after wiping away the sweat drenched hair sticking to it.

The effect wasn't immediate but slowly the convulsions started to slow down and Keith was able to gain enough control to breathe without any grunts or whimpers. Hunk had since gone to sit beside Lance and was currently rubbing his back.

"Is..Is he okay? What happened?" Pidge asked as Keith's breath returned to a cadence somewhat normal and the tremors slowed and softened to a much less alarming quake.

"He'll be just fine…" Hunk spoke up immediately, and continued on some sort of comforting explanation Shiro didn't listen to.

Instead, he leaned over to whisper into Keith's ear. Keith, whose body was still declaring mutiny had yet to so much as attempt to open his eyes, let alone speak, but Shiro figured he should ask anyway.

"Do you want me to tell them?" He whispered in his little brother's ear.

After a pause, Keith nodded.

Okay, then.

"Thank you Hunk. But that's not exactly true." Shiro paused, his glance toward Hunk turned into a long look at Lance, who looked like he was about to break, but nodded to Shiro and gave him a thumbs up gesture in lieu of the smile he attempted and failed to provide.

"Keith has a condition called Dysmorthemia. It's-"

"WHAT!?" Pidge's scream cut Shiro off.

"You're lying. Keith doesn't have any of the sort. He wouldn't be stupid enough to become a paladin knowing that. That would, what, HALVE his life expectancy! NO! I REFUSE!" The shear outrage on Pidge's face was too much and Shiro had to look down as they stormed past and left the room.

Keith's eyes were open. And watching him.

"What is Dysmorthemia?" Coran asked as Hunk and Allura ran after Pidge; once the rest of the room had recovered from their shock.

Shiro heard him but before he could pull together an answer, Lance, freshly researched on the condition, launched into an overly detailed, scientific explanation.

"I'm sorry." Were the first, breathless, scratchy words out of Keith's mouth.

"Don't be. It's not your fault. And Pidge will come around. No one else is mad. You did well, kiddo."

Keith was not too tired to glare at Shiro for the use of the childhood nickname.

But before anyone could go any further, Pidge burst into the room, dragging a slightly wary looking Hunk and a determined looking Allura behind them. The three of them came over to where Shiro and Keith were still on the floor, and as Hunk bent down as if to talk to Shiro, Allura mirrored him for Keith.

"We're putting you in a cryo pod." Pidge announced, instead. Leaving no room for questions and no time for counters before Allura scooped the weakly protesting Keith up.

"Wait! Allura!" Shiro jumped to his feet but she was already out the door and Hunk had a hand on Shiro's shoulder.

"Hey man, it can't hurt. Besides, it will make everyone feel better. And who knows, it may help. Alien technology is weird like that." Hunk's voice was confident and reassuring, but his eyes were pleading with Shiro to accept this answer.

Shiro nodded, it actually wasn't a half bad idea. If nothing else, it would give Keith a chance to recuperate from the episode.

He looked over to Lance and Coran.

"So that was what you earthlings call a 'sea shore'?" Coran was asking.

"NO! It's not a seizure. It just looks like one. It's his body reacting to itself, not his brain misfiring!"

Shiro shook his head and sighed. Lance was being overly dramatic about Coran's lack of understanding, but Shiro guessed he understood where he was coming from. It was probably easier for him to freak out at Coran than to allow himself to actually freak out about Keith.

Shiro was personally just glad his own emotions were still mostly in check, his sudden exhaustion making it difficult to keep his expression controlled as he left the room to follow after Keith and Allura.

At least no one had noticed his tears.


	5. Chapter 5

Partly Cloudy Skies: Part 1 (Lance POV)

Lance must have looked rather like a grumpy merry-go-round pony as he paced in a tight circle around Keith. The red paladin, for his part, was snugly cocooned in the cryo pod; in that weird, coma-like induced sleep that leaves you feeling less rested than whatever state you went in. And out of it enough to think you were dreaming. Lance knew that specific feeling all too well.

Why did the stupid process have to take so LOOONNNGGGGG? It's not like Keith actually had any damage to repair for crying out loud...

Lance circled around the pod again.

Three days.

Round.

Three days he's been in that cryo pod.

And round...

Stupid. Magic. Healing. Meat freezer.

...and round.

Just 'cause it can freeze a person for 10,000 years or whatever does NOT mean it can take all the time in the universe just to make someone feel a bit better.

It wasn't until Coran started launching into another attempt to explain exactly what a cryo pod was, technologically speaking; that Lance realized he had been speaking out loud.

"Yeah, that's all very fascinating, Coran." Lance interrupted. "But with all that fancy technology, why is it so hard to have it work on a timer?"

It was Coran's sharp intake of breath as he prepared to answer the rhetorical question that had Lance stopping his incessant circling of the cryo pod.

Lance had been circling the unconscious form of Keith for so long now, that when he stopped, his head tried to keep circling. So to avoid looking as off-balance as he felt, Lance plopped down on the steps with a huff.

Once he was still, all the fight left him, vacating the hollow left by his lack of sleep.

Lance didn't understand why he was SO freaked out by this.

This is Keith's life on the line….Lance's brain oh so helpfully reminded him. Again.

But technically speaking, nothing was new. It had apparently always been that way with Keith.

Lance just didn't know or see it until now.

How can he feel hollow and heavy at the same time?

...Maybe he needed more sleep than he realized.

With a sigh, Lance looked up from a shiny spot on the floor to see Shiro, mirroring his position across the room.

Shiro, at least, had had the forethought to change out of his armor before resuming his own daily vigil over Keith.

Lance couldn't help but feel guilty. Here he was, allowing himself to pout and freak out when Shiro over there was somehow remaining calm, cool, and collected.

Well, outwardly, anyway.

They're brothers…

Lance, of all people, understood the fear of watching as your little sibling dealt with pain, and knowing there's nothing you can do to help.

It wasn't that long ago, was it, when Lance's little sis had gotten her surgery.

Of course, Lance reminded himself, she had never been in any real danger. Not like this. But that alone had been scary enough…

Okay...maybe it was time to give Shiro some privacy.

"Hey, Coran!" Lance called, stretching to stand. "You know, I'm rather hungry, and the food station just never works very well for me, and you are the food g-er I mean...true feast-master, after all…"

Lance was admittedly a little rusty. His methods needed more honing if they were going to work on anyone else. It had been a while since the last time he had needed to sweet talk his way out of anything.

But judging by the amount of utter sunshine and rainbows pouring out of his face, Coran seemed to be the perfect amount of susceptible to Lance's charms.

"Of course, my boy! Why didn't you just ask?" Coran practically sang, already heading for the door.

With one last glance toward Shiro, Lance followed him out.

Shiro seemed to have been paying at least some attention to their exchange, as he was giving Lance a tired, but genuine smile.

If sweet-talking Coran had been the easy part of Lance's plan, feigning enjoyment as he did his best to gulp down the gooier than usual food goo, with Coran excitedly taking in his every move, was 100% the hard part.

Eventually, enough of the green slime had left Lance's plate that he was able to lean back in his chair with a sigh and a thank you toward the satisfied Altean.

Checking his ticker, Lance had to do a double-take. His charade had worked better than expected. It had taken him over an hour to eat the food goo.

Oh well, maybe that had been enough time for Shiro…

As if on cue, Shiro came in, concern and hope mixing together in his expression as he hobbled along, stooped down to support an exhausted looking Keith.

"KEITH!" Lance shouted, unable to help himself. Excitement and relief bubbling over into his voice.

Keith lifted his head up and looked around for the source of the noise, eyes squinting in the bright white light of the dining room.

Eventually, they focused on Lance and Keith's face broke out into a...genuine...grin?

"Heeey." Was Keith's breathy, drawn out response to go with his smile.

Lance knew the wonky feeling of coming out of the cryo pod and how it messed with your head..but seriously...what?

Shiro, already on high alert, snapped his head toward Lance, his look of warning softening when he saw no hint of teasing in Lance's face.

"Hey look," Keith mumbled to Shiro. Just loud enough that Lance could barely make it out. "It's my favorite." He added. His wobbly finger pointing somewhere between the plate of food Coran was brandishing and Lance.

A wave of shock zipped through Lance at the words he thought he heard.

Lance studied Keith's eyes closely, trying to figure out if they were looking at him or the admittedly delicious looking plate of food. However, Keith was still squinting too hard from the brightness of the kitchen to tell. To be fair, Lance reminded himself, Keith hadn't eaten in three days. And Hunk had made this one-man-feast specifically for whenever Keith decided to wake up. Of course he would be referring to the food.

But it was Shiro's chuckle that had Lance stop what he was doing and take stock of his own expression...and the heat rising in his cheeks.

"Good to see you, Sleeping Beauty." Lance listened to himself say, without so much as a hint of sarcasm to be heard.

"Welcome back to the land of the living, my friend." Lance continued on quickly, after Keith's smile only grew wider in response and Shiro's look turned curious. Ducking his head, Lance didn't let his eyes stray from his plate as he scrambled to get out of his seat in the hope of clearing space for Shiro to set Keith down.

Keith's only response seemed to be his smile turning to a slight pout before focusing on the delicious looking plate of Hunk-prepared food before him.

Lance decided his job was done and he escaped out of the dining room with one last look at Shiro, to see a relieved smile starting to spread across the black paladin's features. Enough of a confirmation of Keith's well being for now, until Lance could talk to a right-minded Keith in his own time.

In the meantime, Lance decided to go find the other two Earthlings on the ship.

He actually hadn't seen too much of either Pidge or Hunk the since the other night when shit hit the fan, come to think of it. It wasn't that he had been avoiding them on purpose… Lance just couldn't bring himself to leave Keith alone in the cryo pod. He remembered what it was like to come in and out of consciousness in that pod. How it felt to be so isolated and confused when you couldn't hear, touch, see, smell, or interact with the outside world, let alone think clearly enough to know what the hell's going on.

Not that Lance could remember if company helped or not. He just didn't want to risk it.

And besides. He wasn't exactly sure what to say to the other two...Or how much he was allowed to say.

But as he found the two of them gathered in the extra hangar they had long since commandeered for their tinkering, he figured he could at least make his presence known and spread the good news of Keith being up and about once again.

The moment he walked into the large, cluttered room, he might as well have been able to lick the air, as thick with awkward tension as it was.

Pidge was sitting there, feet planted firmly on the ground, knees splayed on either side of their body. Which was lowered uncomfortably close to the laptop resting on the floor. Their knees reaching up past their ears as they typed with slightly too much vigor to be good for the keys.

Hunk was sitting beside them, cross-legged with various bits and pieces of plastics, metals, and wires piled in the space between his legs and spilling over, onto, and around his lap. He had a jumbled conglomeration of other such plastic, metal, and wire bits in his hands that he was turning back and forth, studying intently.

A normal enough scene.

So what was with the uncomfortably awkward feel between them?

Oh well, what good was Lance if he couldn't lighten the mood? That was, like, his job, after all, since no one else around ever seemed willing or able to.

"Well, well! Fancy seeing you two here." Lance spoke, changing his gate to a saunter as he walked closer to them.

Hunk's hello was timid, but at least it was genuine and warm.

Pidge's greeting, on the other hand, sounded suspiciously like "Go away, Lance." Though Lance chose to not be entirely sure about this as they hadn't so much as glanced his way since he'd walked in.

"Nice to see the both of you, as well!" Lance continued. Ignoring the all too familiar phrase.

"Looks like you two are tinkering hard, as usual, I just stopped by to see your lovely faces and to let you know that our dearest Keith has awakened from his slumber!" Lance spoke with a bow, having reached as near to their work area as he dared. (He still remembered the blow to his ego from last time he had accidently stepped on one of their techno-baubles...)

"We know." Pidge answered, this time bothering to glance up at Lance. Though possibly less to view Lance himself and more to gauge his proximity to their project.

"What?" Lance demanded, taken off guard. There was no way. Hunk's daily stop by the infirmary hadn't happened yet, and as far as Lance was aware, Pidge hadn't so much as set foot in that room since having Keith thrown into the pod, to begin with.

"Yeah, man! We got to watch him waking up from here! It was all Pidge's idea! We hacked into the security footage and we've been keeping an eye on things from here! You should have seen him, when he first got out, he was even wobblier than you were! Haha! He was so out of it, he spent a whole minute just patting Shiro's head! It was ADORABLE!" Hunk gushed. Lance couldn't tell if his gushing was from genuine excitement or nerves. It was sometimes hard to tell with Hunk.

Wait. Pidge had set that up? Pidge hadn't shown any interest in Keith, or anyone else in the castle for that matter, for three days! Why did THEY get to see Keith being all adorable and sweet like that?!

"Oh." Lance stalled before a question occurred to him. "Well, did yo-"

"Keith's vitals are all fine if that's what you're wondering." Pidge interrupted him. Finally stopping the vigorous typing to sit up and look at Lance properly. "I hacked into the audio feed too when I noticed he was waking up. They checked all his vital signs and he looks to be in better shape than he's been since before we attacked the Galra station."

"So he's all better?" Lance asked, too excited by the news to be bothered with the exhaustion and deadened expression Pidge was leveling him with.

"Looks like it. But I wouldn't be so sure. This technology is meant to cryogenically freeze Alteans and heal physical damage. It's not meant to fix a body's natural state. Much less a human's. Any benefit he receives is probably temporary." Pidge spoke up. Voice monotone, matter-of-fact, and lifeless.

"BUUTT!" Hunk spoke up, a little too loud. "We don't know that for certain. We will just have to wait and see. Either way, it's looking like Keith will be feeling all better once he fully wakes back up!"

Both Lance and Pidge gave Hunk a smile, at that. He was so good at saying what needed to be heard.

"That IS true." Pidge consented with a nod to Hunk and another smile before standing up to stretch. "Which, even if it isn't permanent, should give me time to instigate Plan B." With this declaration, Pidge glanced from Hunk to Lance's now concerned face. "Don't worry. It will have a better name by the time I am ready to introduce it to Keith." They added. As if that was the problematic part, here.

"Uhm..What IS Plan B?" Lance asked, Hunk's look of uncertainty not helping with the concern beginning to bubble up in his gut.

"Oh, it's nothing yet." Pidge said, far too dismissively for Lance's liking. But Pidge was too busy collecting their stuff to see the worry clearly etched in Lance's face.

"It's not dangerous, is it?" Lance had to ask. "I mean, you're not going to inject him with anything or blow him up, are you?

This earned Lance a chuckle from Hunk and a glare from Pidge.

"Nooooo…" Pidge drew out their answer.

Aaaand now Lance was definitely scared.

"Spill it." Lance demanded. "You're up to something not good. I can tell."

"That's not it!" Pidge defended with anxiety and a wave of other emotions Lance couldn't identify breaking through their flatline facade for the first time, as their deadpan expression was replaced by one of fear and hurt.

"It's actually isn't a bad idea, Lance. Pidge just doesn't want to discuss it with everyone until we know it could work." Hunk explained.

"Then why do you know about it?" Lance was not ready to back down yet. As much as Lance trusted his two teammates, something was fishy.

"Because he helped me come up with it. Chill. What's with the sudden bodyguard like obsession? It's not like Keith hasn't been able to stand up for and take care of himself thus far..." As they talked, the fear in Pidge's expression slowly got replaced by a weird combination of suspicion and amusement that made Lance nervous for no good reason.

"Nothing!" Lance demanded. Very unhappy with this sudden turn of events leaving him somehow on the defensive.

But why did his declaration, as entirely true as it was, have to come out sounding like a child who'd just gotten caught coloring the walls with sharpie?

"Whatever." Lance grumbled. "I'm off to visit Blue. I'd only stopped by to tell you guys the good news, anyway."

And with that, Lance, putting his strut back on, left the room and headed a few hangars down to where the lions were resting.

To be honest, this was always a part of the day Lance looked forward to. He might not be the tinkerer Hunk and Pidge are. And he might not be as obsessed with perfection as the Enigma Bros. But there was something so special about his daily visit and check-up with Blue. No matter what was running through his head, when he and Blue were linked, she was always willing to listen to his rants and stories. For an alien warship/robot/lion creation, she always seemed to understand him. Even if she couldn't possibly know or care about how important the taste of homemade birthday cake was, she always made sure he knew she understood just how much he missed it.

Not to mention, the communal hangar as a whole was one of the best sights in the entire castle. It's only when all the lions were gathered together in their common area that these giant feats of alien technology and engineering actually acted kind of like the cats they were modeled after. Not that there were any giant balls of alien string for them to chase. And they never did any of those weird cat things like lick their paws or claw at the wall. But they didn't just sit there completely devoid of life in their self-contained shields either.

When the door opened, Lance was greeted by the sight of the five lounging lionesses, with Blue closest to him. As he walked in, he watched her eyes light up as she stretched and maneuvered lazily to face him.

"Hello there, lovely." He greeted her, his muscles immediately adjusting into a relaxed gait and smile as he approached her. And he could just feel her non-existent returning smile.

"It's good to see you too my lady." He said, reaching up to rub the underside of her chin eliciting a purr that echoed through his mind. "Will ya open up for me, hun?" Lance asked and, of course, she obliged.

After running the daily diagnostic check, and a lengthy conversation catching Blue up on everything that happened that day, Lance figured he had time to take her out for a quick jaunt around the castle to stretch her robo-muscles before dinner. But first, he wanted to let someone else know where he was going.

As he was leaving Blue, Lance caught the sound of another, human voice. A rather petulant sounding one.

"Aw, come on! Don't be like that!" Keith's voice positively whined.

Lance froze just inside Blue's mouth. Of course Keith would want to visit Red after waking up.

Lance waited to see if Keith would say any more, or if he could hear anyone else in the hangar.

"Look, I'm sorry, okay?"..."Yeah, I know I messed up. But no you didn't call it so don't you go lording it over me."..."Nope! I know for a fact this wasn't in your knowledge base. If Allura and Coran didn't know it existed, neither could you."..."Look, it's been three days since you've been checked, let alone taken for a ride. And I never got a chance to test the new battery pack."..."Okay fine. I'll explain everything if you just let me in...but I'm warning you. You won't like it. So don't get angry at me when I tell you things you don't want to hear."... "Thanks, kitty."

Lance now had the palm of his hand pressed as hard as he could against his mouth to keep himself from laughing out loud. Keith and Red sounded like an old married couple. And that was only with the half of the conversation Lance could hear.

But then that meant that Keith had even hidden his condition from Red...Did that mean Shiro hadn't told Black? Wow. Was Lance the only one who was entirely open with his lion?

Blue's slight purr at his internal mention of her brought Lance out of his line of thought.

Listening closely, Lance could hear Keith's muffled voice as he talked to Red. While Lance couldn't make out the precise words, even after fully exiting Blue and walking closer to the smaller lion, he could tell by the intonation of Keith's voice that things weren't going smoothly.

The thought of taking Blue out for a joyride having been put on the back burner, Lance settled himself down in a spot along Blue's side, leaning against her back paw as he listened to the slightly incoherent drama unfold.

Eventually, Keith's voice went from indignant through resigned to apologetic. It seemed like he and Red had made up and she had come out the victor. But what was he apologizing for? Hunk had said his vitals had shown him feeling better than ever!

And Pidge had said it was temporary...his unnecessarily helpful mind added it's unwelcome two cents.

But Lance didn't know that for sure yet. He would have to talk to Keith himself, first.

And again with Lance's perfect timing, Red's mouth opened, just as he had reached the needed conclusion.

Keith's eyes were solemn and downcast as he stepped out of Red.

"Well look who it is, our very own miracle boy." Lance shouted over to him.

Keith was so startled, he tripped and fell the rest of the way out of the lion's mouth.

"Lance!" He roared. "What the hell are you doing here?!"

Was it Lance being paranoid again or did it take him the tiniest bit longer than it should have to get back up?

"Same as you, idiot. Blue needs love and care, too." Lance smirked, standing up to level with Keith.

"Whatever." Keith responded, hands heading back to their favored position in the crooks of each other's elbows.

But when the red paladin didn't make any move to leave, Lance decided to take it as an invitation.

"Seriously, though, how are you feeling?" Lance asked, walking over to Keith to get a proper look at him.

"Fine." Keith answered too quickly. "Better. Much better." As if to prove his point, Keith held up a hand to show Lance that it was still and not shaking under its own insignificant weight.

But Lance caught the underlying contradiction.

"Not all better, though. Right?" At this point, Lance was standing directly in front of Keith, mirroring his body language.

"Well, no. But I didn't expect anything less...What?" Keith's answer changed from grudgingly honest to wary as he took in Lance's face.

Lance decided Keith didn't need to know just how upset this answer was making him. How disappointed and scared he was at the confirmation of Pidge's worry. Even if it was sneaking into his facial expression against his permission.

"Well, I for one appreciated the compliment this morning." Lance teased, instead.

"...What..compliment?" Now it was Keith's turn to look scared.

"I do believe a certain red paladin has declared me his favorite." Lance pretended to muse.

"Did not." The frustratingly calm certainty in Keith's voice confirmed Lance's unspoken question. It had been the dish after all.

But he wasn't going to let something as small as being wrong stop him that easily.

"Did too."

"Nuh-uh"

"Yeah!"

"Nope. Don't remember. Didn't happen." The pride on Keith's face took over from the nervously annoyed look...it wasn't fair.

"Did you just?" How dare Keith use Lance's own words against him?!

"Ayup. Now if you will excuse me, I need to take Red out for a ride."

Lance decided to let this one go in light of the current circumstances.

"Mind if Blue and I join you? We were going to do the same until you and Red interrupted us with your marital squabble."

"Wait you heard that?! Ugh, never mind. Do whatever you like. Just know that Red and I won't be slowing down for you." And with that, Keith turned on his heel and stormed back into Red, whatever he had left her for apparently having been forgotten.

Lance figured that with the two of them out, the others would be less concerned than if it was just him or Keith individually, so he just followed suit and climbed back into Blue's awaiting mouth.

As they flew, Blue and Red (and their paladins) played chase with each other, while Lance and Keith talked. It was quite nice, actually. With Blue's calming presence directly in his head, Lance found it easier to talk to Keith without needing to retaliate to every word out of Keith's mouth. And while Lance had a hard time imagining Red being a calming influence, the same seemed to hold true for Keith.

They talked about how Keith really was feeling better, but how Pidge's prediction seemed to be right, as Keith was feeling the dull muscle ache he apparently constantly carried around already returning. And in return for his honesty, Lance warned Keith about Pidge's suspicious 'Plan B' whatever that was.

They even joked together about what it might be, as morbid as the topic was.

"At least," Lance spoke silently to Blue, "At least Keith was talking and laughing about it, and no longer just hiding from it...even if it only sounded like he was trying to downplay the whole thing. Which is weird."

Blue's hum in his ear agreed.

Eventually, they decided it was probably time to head back and join the others. Lance had been missing for a good portion of the day at this point, and Keith had apparently slipped away before Coran could subject him to another round of diagnostic testing.

But when they arrived at the hangar, it wasn't Coran who was waiting for them.

Far scarier of a sight.

It was Pidge who greeted them with the frightening expression of concerned eyes and a determined pout.

As soon as the two of them had left the safety of their respective lions, Pidge pounced.

At first, they just circled around an utterly confused Keith, like a judge in a pet beauty contest.

"I was right. Wasn't I?" Pidge asked. It wasn't clear which one of them the green paladin was asking, but it was Keith who finally answered. Unable to keep the look of defeat entirely off of his face.

"Apparently so?"

"Well then, I think it's time for Plan B. Also known as Project Backup Keith. And there's no time to waste."

And with that, Pidge grabbed Keith by the wrist and marched out the door. Leaving Lance, Blue, and Red to their own devices.


	6. Chapter 6

There was zero chance Pidge was going to lose anyone else.

No, wait.

That's not accurate.

Pidge hadn't lost anyone yet.

Lose anyone at all, then.

It wasn't going to happen.

If Altean technology wasn't able to fix Keith's doomed body, well, then they would just have to make a copy that didn't rely on a body. And seeing as Pidge was somehow lucky enough to have that as a valid option, you can go ahead and bet your last dollar they would take advantage of it.

Convincing Allura and Coran was easy enough. Apparently, all it took for Pidge to get permission to play with their highly advanced, alien technology was explaining what was actually happening to Keith.

The first time Pidge voiced the idea to anyone other than Hunk was during dinner on the second day of Keith's stay in the cryo pod. Until then (or more accurately, even then), Pidge hadn't felt like interacting with their fellow humans, let alone the currently lost aliens who were full of questions that apparently neither Lance nor Shiro were answering satisfactorily.

The only reason Pidge was interacting with anyone at all was because Hunk wouldn't leave them alone, and, according to him, humans needed to eat… Pidge's jury was still out on this detail. It's just too much of a hassle and takes up too much time that could be spent more productively. Just like sleep.

It had actually been Allura who had asked the first question. Pulling Pidge from their silent scheming. Seeing as Lance and Shiro had both taken their dinner to the cryo pod room and Hunk was in the middle of a mouthful of food, it had fallen to Pidge to answer.

"Sorry, princess. Could you repeat the question?" Pidge had asked, putting a mental bookmark in their thought process for later.

"I was just curious how Keith could have a sickness if he doesn't have a disease." She asked, waving her spoon to and fro as she spoke.

To be honest, this was exactly what Pidge had been wanting to avoid. Talking about it only made it feel more real. It's one thing if the discussion helps with finding a way to fix everything. But just talking about it aimlessly only added to that constant, cold trickle of despair that had begun to pool at the pit of Pidge's stomach. It didn't do anyone any good and only made it harder to find the right answer. Pidge had already learned this from before, with Matt and Dad. As far as Pidge could tell, ignoring it was the only way to get anything helpful done.

But it made sense that the Alteans were curious. And knowledge is power. So it was only right to take the time to explain what was happening to Keith.

"Well, he isn't SICK, exactly…" Pidge had started. Sometimes, the cultural gap really struck Pidge by surprise. Exactly what things Pidge found themself explaining to the vastly more advanced and knowledgeable Alteans sometimes caught Pidge off guard.

"Then what's wrong with him? If he isn't sick and he isn't injured, why is there a problem?" Allura actually looked doubtful, as if Pidge was trying to explain Bigfoot, as opposed to a perfectly logical, nearly self-explanatory aspect of life.

"Do Alteans not have any naturally occurring biological conditions or disorders?" Pidge couldn't help but ask. That would be interesting. If that was the case, maybe Pidge could study up on Altean medicine to take back to Earth some day.

"Well, what do you mean by 'biological condition'?"

"It's when there is a...how shall I say... hiccup or malfunction somewhere within your biology, usually in your DNA or caused by your environment during fetal development," Pidge explained.

This was where Coran had stepped in, his bafflingly diverse knowledge of history helping him understand the concept Pidge was trying to get across. As it turns out, Alteans used to have similar conditions, once upon a time. But they had long since been dealt with. Far before either of the two Alteans or even their great-grandparents had been born.

Allura, who, once she was caught up, did, in fact, remember hearing about such things having existed during the Altean equivalent of the Dark Ages, switched gears from disbelief to horror fast enough that Pidge was left playing catch up.

Pidge was too tired for people. Alien or otherwise.

But that had been the perfect opportunity to bring up Pidge's plan. Even if it wasn't fully developed yet and Pidge had wanted to run it by Keith first.

But then again, this was Keith, they were talking about. He probably would have found one reason or another to avoid it, as silly as it would be if he wasn't entirely outnumbered.

And thus, Project Back-Up-Keith was born.

It was a harmless enough plan, really. As the Alteans were already equipped with advanced enough AI technology to transfer a person's thoughts and memories into a prepared AI shell and holographic body; it would be pretty simple to re-program the mechanism already in the castle to work with human minds.

And the process should be pretty painless, as well. According to Coran, usually, they are able to have a direct data transfer that only takes a couple sessions of plugging the person into the machine and having them sleep through the data gathering process.

Though, as Pidge, Hunk, and Coran began tinkering with the mechanisms needed on the third day of Keith's hibernation, it had become apparent that between the three of them, there just wasn't enough knowledge of the nuances of the human brain to make a direct transfer possible.

This was only a minor setback, though, as far as Pidge was concerned. All it meant was that Keith would have to consciously interact with the AI, most likely by talking to it and telling it stories. Of course, it wouldn't be quite as accurate as a neuron-for-neuron copy, but considering the time restraints, this would have to do. Coran at least seemed pretty confident that if they utilized the telepathic technology they already knew worked with the human brain, there should be plenty of shared data between the two to successfully transfer Keith's consciousness (or a faithful copy thereof) into the holographic shell.

All that was left, by the time Keith was awake and galavanting around with Lance was to develop the holograph itself and get the red paladin on board with the plan.

They didn't know why, but something in the back of Pidge's mind figured that things would go a whole lot more smoothly if Keith wasn't given too much time to ruminate over his new daily program.

So that's why Pidge was refusing to answer the stuttering questions spewing out of the red paladin's mouth as they marched down the halls to the AI chamber.

For his part, Keith didn't respond too poorly to the idea.

To be fair, he didn't respond at all, at first.

He just kind of stood there, staring at some point in the space between Pidge and the holographic platform. He didn't so much as offer a frown to alert Pidge to his opinion on the matter.

Well, no news is good news, as they say.

Maybe he was just confused.

Not letting Keith's lack of response get to them, Pidge handed over the questionnaire Hunk had helped them create.

He looked through the pages, though Pidge suspected that he wasn't actually reading any of the prompts.

"Why?" He asked, finally looking Pidge directly in the eyes for the first time today.

"Why? Because you're dying!" Pidge didn't mean to yell, and they were pretty sure Keith didn't mean to cringe in response. But that didn't stop either from happening.

For the first time since the episode three days back, Pidge forced themself to stop and truly look at the red paladin. He looked...small (which was saying something coming from Pidge). And tired. There were frustration and general discomfort in his stance; and the near constant hint of grumpy confusion lingering around the edges of his expression. But to be honest, Keith also just looked scared.

No, maybe that's not the right word. Vulnerable?

Vulnerable was closer, Pidge guessed. But either way, it made them uneasy. They needed to find some way to get rid of the cause of that expression.

"We can't let that happen, Keith." They did their best to quiet their voice to something a little less accusatory, but it came out sounding more like the voice Pidge would use to comfort a wounded animal.

They were not good with this kind of thing. Feelings had never been their forte. And from what they knew of Keith, he was in the same boat.

Fantastic.

Keith responded better to the wounded animal voice, though, albeit with a hint of annoyance.

Keith did as Pidge told him to and held out his arms on either side as Pidge walked around him with the portable scanning device and scanned his specs into their computer. Once all the data was saved, all Pidge had to do was feed it into the holographic center and voila, Keith 2.0 appeared in all his glory, standing on the stage, face blank and arms out. Nothing but an empty holographic shell.

Without looking at his reaction to seeing his holographic twin or giving him a chance to escape, Pidge sat the original Keith down on the floor in front of the pedestal and fit the telepathic headpiece (now connected to the AI control panel via a forest of cables and wires) snuggly onto Keith's head and switched it on.

The reaction in Keith 2.0 was immediate. While its face remained blank, the image flickered out of existence for a millisecond before reappearing in a mirrored image of the real Keith, cross-legged on the floor.

Original Keith's posture stiffened but he remained silent. Just staring at the holographic image of himself, now looking vaguely back at him. It was a strange sight to behold; and honestly, as many utterly surreal experiences as Pidge had witnessed since joining Voltron, this very well might have to take the cake. They couldn't imagine what it must be like for Keith.

After a moment or two, Pidge pulled themself together and hopped into action.

"Alright." Pidge started but immediately had to pause.

Both Keiths had slowly looked over to Pidge at the sound of their voice. In perfect sync. With identically blank, emotionless expressions.

The resident Shining twins just sat there, completely unaware they were apparently the monster duo of their very own horror movie. But at least they waited patiently for Pidge to regain control over their heart rate before continuing.

"Well, as you, uh, Original Keith, can see in your packet; there are four sections of questions, one for each of the daily sessions." Original Keith looked down to the stack of papers in his hands at that, with Keith 2.0 doing the same to the empty space between his ever so slightly see-through fingers.

"They are roughly divided into categories with purposeful overlap so don't think you can skip a question just because you sort of answered it before." Keith 2.0's face scrunched up into an annoyed grimace as it's hand sifted through non-existant pages. At least Pidge knew it was acting as a faithful mimic.

"The questions in each section are ordered by intensity and depth, from easiest to hardest to help ease you into the more personal questions. While it is vital that Original Keith talks out loud when answering the questions, the neural relay device is there to provide context from the memories, emotions, and unspoken thoughts associated with the question."

For whatever reason, Pidge found it easier to watch the holographic Keith than the original one. Even if they both had settled their grimace into identically uncomfortable pouts. Keith was allowed to be uncomfortable with this, Pidge told themself. What mattered was that he did it.

"Understood?" Pidge demanded.

"...yeah." Thankfully, only Original Keith actually vocalized his response, as unenthusiastic as it was.

After an uncomfortably long silence that Pidge suspected to be a battle of wills between themself and Keith (Poor soul had no idea, did he? He honestly thought he stood a chance against them), the red paladin sighed so hard it sent a shudder through both his body and Keith 2.0.

"Name: Keith Kagone. Age: 17. Occupation: Uhh, Red Paladin of Voltron. I guess…" Keith's voice started robotically listing off both the questions and answers.

Pidge, for their part, had no interest in listening to the actual answers and so tuned out the other's voice until it was just a stuttering rumble as they focused their attention on the stats on their computer.

Everything actually looked like it was working smoothly. There were two steady streams of data flowing from Original Keith into Keith 2.0. The surface scanner was picking up on Original Keith's body language and voice while the neural relay was seemingly picking up on everything running through Keith's mind. Which apparently was quite a lot, judging by the discrepancy between the veritable trickle of info coming from the surface scanner and the onslaught of data being picked up by the neural relay.

It was fascinating. Pidge found themself just watching their screen, transfixed by the ever-changing flow of data between the two entities before them.

But about an hour and a half in, after a particularly large spike in the neural data flow, the trickle of vocal data came to a halt.

Looking up, Pidge found that the Keiths, roughly a quarter of the way through the section, had stopped talking and were now looking back and forth between Pidge, each other, and the papers.

"What's up?" Pidge asked.

"I...I don't want to do this." Original Keith spoke at Keith 2.0, apparently refusing to look at Pidge. "I don't like these questions. I don't talk about this stuff to anyone… Besides, I-"

But Pidge didn't let him finish his sentence.

"Ahh. No worries, man." Pidge said, hopping up as they did so. They had actually figured this point would come. Keith has always been rather mum on the subject of Keith, after all.

"It's an easy fix! I'll just leave you two alone in here and monitor your stats remotely. You don't have to worry about Keith 2.0 blabbing your secrets. His feelings on them are yours so if you don't want it known, neither will he. But don't think you can sneak out or stop answering questions. I will see if you break the connection." Pidge said in a rush, pointing threateningly toward their laptop as they spoke.

And with that, they were sweeping out of the room, pretending not to notice the sputtering and grumbling coming from Keith as he gingerly sat himself back down.

To be fair, they had always been rather proud of themself and their conflict avoidance skills.

Not so much their observational skills, however.

As soon as they stepped through the doorway, they collided with a solid object in what should have been open walkway space.

A rather Lance-shaped object, to be precise.

"Lance! What the hell!?" Pidge hissed at the pouting Lance who was now hopping in place while rubbing the foot Pidge had stepped on in the collision. "Were you spying?"

"No! I mean...I was jus-" he paused, before shaking his head, and assuming a stance that almost looked like an attempt at threatening. "IIIII just wanted to make sure youuuu weren't subjecting Keith to one of your freaky, mad scientist experiments!"

Frankly, Pidge didn't have the time or patience to deal with an in-denial-Lance just now, and so didn't feel the slightest bit of remorse in rolling their eyes and walking past the blue paladin.

But Lance, ever the puppy-dog, trailed after Pidge; blabbing something about how Keith wouldn't like this and how it wouldn't work because the holographic version would never be the real Keith and that Pidge was wasting Keith's time by forcing him to do this.

For the most part, Pidge just tuned him out, focusing on the influx of data running across their screen. But when this was still going on, after Lance had followed Pidge all the way to the common room, it was time to put an end to this nonsense.

"Look, Lance," Pidge finally spoke up, turning to meet Lance eye to eye, " I'm not actually holding your boyfriend hostage and torturing him against his will. If he really wants to leave, there's nothing stopping him."

And just like that, Lance's ever continual wellspring of chatter seemed to dry up. Aha! Pidge had thought as much. Not that it was hard to guess. Coran seemed to think Lance and Keith were already a couple, based on his commentary when they weren't around. But Pidge had never been great at picking up on such clues. So having it confirmed before those involved even acknowledged it was a small victory in Pidge's mind.

"What. No! What? Wait... WHAT?!" Lance stammered. How he managed to convey every emotion from confusion to anger to curiosity to fear using only a combination of three different words was beyond Pidge.

"You heard me." Was all Pidge could squeeze out without letting the laughter escape into their voice.

"Keith is SO not my boyfriend?" Lance cried, what was supposed to be an emphatic statement turning into a question at the end.

"Fine. Your crush then. You really haven't been very subtle about it, you know." As boring as this topic was, it was working wonders in its intended goal of distracting Lance.

And so the rest of Keith's first session passed without incident as Pidge kept Lance busy with a steady stream of dialogue pointing out to Lance just how obvious he was being. But never once did Pidge let slip any of the evidence proving Keith was in the same boat as Lance. That was for Keith to tell, not Pidge. If there was one people-related thing Pidge did well, it was keeping secrets.

When they finally heard Keith's voice on the intercom informing Pidge he was done, Pidge was out of there before Lance could recover from the last bout of truth Pidge had shoved at him.

Walking into the AI chamber was quite weird. While the holographic shell was still wearing a rather empty expression, Original Keith had moved so that he was leaning his back against the wall while Keith 2.0 was still sitting in the same position he had been when Pidge left. He also greeted Pidge with a nod in their direction, separately from Original Keith's spoken greeting.

At least Pidge knew it was working.

Throughout the next two days, things just kept getting more surreal. It wasn't anyone's fault, really. It was just that Keith's degenerating health wasn't waiting for Pidge's plan to come to completion. Every time Pidge checked up on them during their sessions, Keith 2.0 grew more lifelike, while Original Keith looked more like the ghost. There weren't any big, dramatic changes, but Pidge could just see the weakness and exhaustion build up in his posture, as his quivering grew ever more pronounced. He would sometimes doze off during the sessions. Probably because he was only willing to start the sessions after he got done with his daily dose of training. Not to mention how it seemed like every time Pidge saw Keith, he was just that much paler.

It wasn't Keith's fault. Pidge knew that well enough. But that didn't mean that Pidge was comfortable spending any more time looking at Keith than they had to. They really felt bad about it. It was obvious that Keith had started noticing Pidge's avoidance of him, although he never directly pointed it out. But he seemed to try and blend into the shadows whenever he and Pidge were in the same room, and he'd stopped expecting Pidge to initiate contact. But there was nothing Pidge could do about it. They had a job to do, and they couldn't let their emotions get the better of them until their job was complete and they had a fully functioning copy of Keith that didn't rely on faulty biology

Hearing about Keith's degenerating health from the others was even harder to take and nearly impossible to avoid, however.

It was right before the fourth session, while Keith was napping and everyone else was preparing for dinner that Pidge hit their limit.

It seemed like Keith was all anyone could talk about that day. And he wasn't even there to argue his own case. Apparently, Keith had full-on fainted during training and hadn't come to until Shiro had gone looking for him only to find him collapsed on the ground.

It was Shiro telling the story, and Pidge could just hear the disappointment and concern dripping from his words.

Lance, of course, hadn't taken the news very well himself. He was in the middle of threatening to start babysitting Keith when Pidge decided they had heard enough and started heading for the door. In his evidence for his logic, Lance was pointing out everything wrong with Keith. Shiro, heaven help him, looked to actually be considering Lance's proposal while Hunk just started humming tunelessly and doubling Keith's helping of dinner.

Allura and Coran had already started debating how much longer Keith's body was going to hold out by the time Pidge could make it to the door. The last few steps hastened by the panic rising to their throat at the Altean's choice of commentary.

Making a B-line to the AI room, Pidge tried to steady themselves before walking in and facing Keith 2.0. At this point, Keith 2.0 knew each of the Paladins by name and would hold conversations with anyone who came in. He picked up on each of their moods very similarly to how Keith would, or rather, how Keith used to when he had first joined Voltron. It was interesting to see just how close to and comfortable with everyone Keith had gotten by comparison to how he used to be. By comparison to current Original Keith, Keith 2.0 regarded everyone with a passive interest at best. Not the best person to walk in on while on the verge of tears.

So Pidge waited until their current wave of panic had subsided before preparing themselves for the usual annoyed greeting.

They were not prepared for Keith 2.0 to silence them with a finger to his lips and a hand held at arm's length to stop them the moment the doors opened.

Pausing in the doorway at the sight, Pidge followed Keith 2.0's line-of-sight.

There, in the corner of the room, still in his armor, slumped against the wall with his head cocked uncomfortably to the side was Keith. Fast asleep. Snoring, even.

Nodding at Keith 2.0 to acknowledge they understood, Pidge walked in, careful not to stomp too loudly.

But when they got all the way into the room, Keith 2.0 beckoned them to his pedestal.

"Sit," He said, curtly but without animosity, and quiet enough so as not to disturb Original Keith.

This was the first time Keith 2.0 had ever initiated conversation with Pidge. So Pidge did as instructed.

"You need to cut this out." Keith 2.0 didn't flinch. He didn't look uncomfortable or nervous. He didn't look mad. He looked desperate.

"What do you mean?" Pidge whispered, not trusting their full voice as panic began to rise again for no reason.

"This. Me. It's idiotic and immature and selfish. The real me won't say anything to you because he doesn't want to hurt you all any more than he already does. But this whole project is just stupid. You don't even see how miserable it's making either of us, do you?"

Pidge didn't have an answer to the question. Or rather, they had two answers to the question. Yes, they had noticed that Keith had never really seemed on board with it, but they had chosen to ignore it. After all, they were going to fix him the best way they could. Pidge told Keith 2.0 so.

"In what universe would this fix anything? In what universe do you think any version of Keith would be okay with this? He's already torn up over how useless he is in his current state. He just wants it all over at this point!" Pidge's breath caught in their throat as they inhaled to protest.

"No don't you dare! Just shut up and listen for once!" Keith 2.0 forged on, his voice now a harsh whisper. "He is useless in his current state and is just taking up everyone's time and resources in exchange for worrying you all. I hear it all the time! He doesn't have anything beneficial to offer anyone anymore and he knows this. The only reason he is still here and hasn't tried to say anything is because he knows it would just upset you guys even more. You're supposed to be the smart one. Use your brain and really look at the situation. You think he enjoys wasting the limited amount of time he has talking to himself? Have you even considered that I don't want this either? Stuck forever as some sort of Keith-shaped decorative piece that exists purely for your entertainment with nothing to offer? Or are you really so small minded that you think doing this would actually fix anything?"

He looked like he was going to continue on, his whisper now a low volume scream. But something in Pidge's face must have stopped him because he just stood there, towering over Pidge, watching as their mind skidded and spun out.

He was right.

Of course, he was.

This would never fix anything. Keith would still die.

This would never be the true Keith.

Keith would still be gone.

And suddenly the panic turned to pain as tears threatened to spill over Pidge's eyes. Not wanting to cry in front of Keith 2.0, even now, Pidge looked up once more at the hologram, hoped the forced eye contact was enough to get their message across, and with a nod, leaned around the platform, opened up the side panel, and flipped the switch.

There was just enough time for Keith 2.0 to utter a relieved "Thank you." before blipping out of existence entirely.

Distractedly, still trying to hold back the break they could feel coming, Pidge fumbled around with their computers and the wires, unplugging everything, deleting the data, and shutting everything down.

And when everything was done, Pidge took one look at Keith, so fragile and weak, even in sleep, his body quivering and spasming against the hard surfaces supporting him.

And the dam broke. Crumpling to the floor, Pidge just gave up and let the tears fall.

There was nothing they could do. There was nothing they could fix. For the first time in their life, they were truly helpless. They couldn't stop this from happening. Keith was disappearing forever. And they were helpless to stop it.

Pidge wasn't sure how long they were there, crumpled on the floor, leaning against the raised AI platform.

They really had been selfish.

They had known this was probably how Keith would respond. But they had wasted four days on it anyway.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity but was probably closer to 15 minutes, the tears dried up of their own accord. Pidge, now exhausted and utterly pissed at anything and everything in the universe that had brought this situation about decided they should probably wake up Keith so he isn't wasting any more time in this godforsaken room.

When they reached Keith's side, they noticed that his breathing was more shallow than it should have been. Not labored, but certainly not the deep, even pace that should come with sleep.

Looks like it's time for another stint in the cryo pod. If he really is going to just slowly disappear, he might as well be more comfortable while doing it.

While looking at him as little as possible, Pidge gently shook Keith awake.

"Get up." They spoke, their voice still waterlogged and rough from crying.

"Go to the cryo pod, idiot." Pidge knew they were sounding mean. But they couldn't help it. They just wanted this over and done with as quickly as possible.

"Pidge! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to fall asleep like that. I'm ready for today's session." Keith mumbled, sitting up straighter and rubbing his neck.

"There is no session. It's over." Pidge retorted. Still not able to keep their eyes on the red paladin.

"What? What do you mean? There's still one more…"

"No! It's over, okay! You got what you wanted now listen to me and get in the freaking cryo pod!" Pidge growled, grabbing Keith by the hand and dragging him out of the doors and down the hallway toward the cryo pod room.

Just like the last time Pidge was dragging a confused Keith through the castle, the former remained silent while the latter sputtered in confusion, stumbling in his attempts to keep up.

When they arrived at the cryo pods, Pidge typed Keith's specs into the nearest one and went to shove the larger paladin inside.

"Pidge! Stop!" Keith yelled, finally getting Pidge's attention.

"What do you mean I got what I wanted?"

"Project Back-Up-Keith is no more, got it? Deleted. Canceled. Non-existent. Now get in the damn pod like a good paladin." And with that, Keith let Pidge remove his armor and shove him into the cryo pod, a look of hurt confusion on his face.

Pidge hurriedly hit the button and with a hiss, the door closed and Keith instantly fell into the induced coma, the emotion on his face fading away in favor of the blank, restful face of unconsciousness.

It took Pidge a long time to tear their eyes away from the sleeping form of Keith. He looked more like himself than he had in days. His body was finally still, and with his hair falling into his face like that, you couldn't really see the under eye bruises that had become permanent the past couple days.

And with him asleep, Pidge didn't have to hear the weak, broken person who absolutely wasn't the Keith they had grown to know and trust. Keith stood up for himself. Keith stood up for everyone. Keith wasn't led anywhere. Keith only went where Keith wanted to go and only did what Keith wanted to do. This person who had been participating in Project Back-Up-Keith wasn't the real Keith.

But the person before them, asleep in the cryo pod, a slight, stubborn scowl permanently ingrained on his features, was far closer to the real Keith.

"Ah. There you are. I brought your dinner." Came a voice from the doorway.

Turning at the sound, it wasn't until Pidge made eye-contact with Hunk that they realized their tears had started falling again.

"Oh. Dear. What happened? Is everything alright?" Hunk launched himself into action, not waiting for Pidge to respond.

The next thing Pidge knew, they were sitting on the steps, leaning into Hunk's shoulder, his arm acting as a blanket, wrapped loosely around them.

"It's not fair. I can't fix it. I hate it." They were mumbling.

"I know. None of us are okay with it, Pidge." Hunk murmured back.

"He probably hates me now for wasting so much of his time and forcing him to do something he clearly didn't want to do. Keith is going to die hating me!" Pidge cried. They hadn't even realized just what they were so upset about until it came from their own lips.

But it was true. If Pidge were in Keith's position, Pidge would hate themself for wasting their limited time on something that they were clearly uncomfortable with.

"Now, I for one know that Keith wouldn't think like that," Hunk spoke, after a minute of letting Pidge silently fume.

"Keith wants this fixed as much as you do. And lord knows not even you could force Keith into doing something he isn't willing to do. I think you two just need to talk." How Hunk could sound so sure of this, Pidge would never know.

"No, he won't. He has already wasted enough of his time with me. He probably won't ever want to interact with me again." Pidge grumbled. They knew they were being petulant, but they were scared. And angry. And hurt. They were allowed to be a little ridiculous.

"Look. Just go get some sleep. You can take your dinner with you. Just go rest. Keith will be out again in a couple days, all rested up and everything. Just go and meet up with him when he gets out and talk to him yourself. The worst that can happen is you guys clear the air." Hunk spoke. Clearly tired and worn thin himself.

And of course, he was right.

Pidge holed themself up in their room for two days straight, remotely monitoring Keith's vitals, and only interacting with the others when Hunk dragged them out of their room for meals.

From what little Pidge picked up on over dinner conversations, Allura and Coran had found a backwater moon to park on for a while. It was apparently far enough away from any place they had been yet, that Zarkon would likely take weeks before locating them. That explained the sudden appearance of purple-hued temperate rainforest scenery that had appeared last time Pidge had looked outside.

According to Coran, the only quirk to this little moon was that it took the term "Rainforest" a little too literally. Apparently, there hadn't been a break in the continual rainfall in any known, recorded history.

Fortunately for Team Voltron (but unfortunately for Lance), this constant dump was about to be accentuated by one of its severe, planet-wide hurricane-like storms that were known to ravage the landscape and entirely uproot the ecosystem every ten-thousand years or so. And seeing as it was in the process of gearing up for one such storm, Allura and Coran had decided it would be the perfect hiding spot.

To be fair, Pidge understood Lance's concern somewhat. They had never been a fan of storms either. But one look at Lance told Pidge that as uncomfortable as he was, even he couldn't deny the assurance hiding within a storm provided.

It was some time after that particular dinner, late enough at night that everyone else in the castle was asleep that Pidge's remote monitoring system alerted them to Keith's waking up.

But by the time they had gotten down there, only a snoring Lance and dreaming Shiro remained in the cryo pod room.

"Keith." Pidge hissed on the intercom.

"Sup?" Came a distracted response.

"Keith! Where the hell did you go?" I need to talk to you!"

"Out." Keith huffed. Pidge could hear exertion-heavy rhythmic breathing.

"Are you...jogging?!" Pidge asked louder, once the doors had closed behind them.

"Yup. Be back soon." And with that, the all too familiar click followed by deadened silence rang in Pidge's ear.

Welp, the Keith they all knew and loved was back.

The idiot had gone outside for a run.


	7. Chapter 7

Keith POV

So maybe going for a run, at night, through an alien rainforest, in the cold wasn't Keith's smartest move to date.

Maybe.

But that just depended on if you took potentially getting himself sick into account.

It had only been a day since he'd snuck out of his cryo pod and decided he needed a run to clear his head.

And to be fair, the run had done exactly that. It had given him time to process what Pidge had said after abandoning their project.

He knew Pidge wanted to talk to him. Had said so quite explicitly, even. But he just couldn't bring himself to go find them. Especially if he was getting sick. Upsetting Pidge more than he apparently had already was not okay.

He didn't blame them for being upset with him. In fact, he agreed with them. They had just been trying to help. And by all rights, it was a clever idea. But try as he might, Keith was just too selfish. How exactly Pidge had found out was a mystery. He could only guess that his holographic twin had mentioned something to them about it while he had been asleep; before that last session that never happened.

So all of their hard work had gone to waste because Keith could never just simply give someone what they wanted. He had to be stubborn and put his own feelings first. Even when it wasn't technically him doing it. Of course Pidge wanted to talk to him now that he was feeling better again. They had done a good job of keeping their disappointment and anger towards him in check before forcing him into the healing pod.

Talking to them now would only make things worse, considering his too quickly deteriorating condition.

And it was deteriorating. Not in the Dysmorthemic sense. He still had a couple days before those symptoms came back full force. But he knew the feeling of an encroaching fever all too well, and the churning in his stomach wasn't exactly a vote of confidence either.

Like hell Keith was going to bother anyone else in the castle with his slip-up, though. Not if he could help it.

They were already wasting too much time and energy on him anyway.

Which is why he was avoiding any and all interaction except mealtime; when he could fake it long enough to eat his meal in as close to silence as possible.

And to be fair, his plan worked for all of two days after his run in the rain before he slipped up.

Of course, Keith wasn't THAT much of an idiot. He'd known he wouldn't be able to keep a fever from the others for long.

But he was still annoyed with himself when he had let Shiro talk him into a light training session after dinner on the second day.

At first things had been going smoothly. Shiro had let Keith choose which exercise to run. Being both the least labor intensive and the least interactive, Keith had gone for the maze. And it had gone smoothly.

But when Shiro had chosen to spar after the success with the maze, things quickly went downhill.

It was in the first round that Keith noticed Shiro was aware that something wasn't quite right.

When Shiro's jab to Keith's gut had caused him to momentarily dry heave, Shiro had paused long enough to give Keith one of his "what do you think you are doing" stares. Which Keith had taken the liberty of ignoring.

But during the second round, Keith began to get dizzy and his body began to stop listening to him altogether.

All it took was one restrained kick to the back to send Keith to the ground, shivering from a phantom chill in the air while too much sweat dripped from his bangs.

"Okay. That's it. We are done here. What aren't you telling me?" Shiro asked as he eased himself onto the ground beside Keith who hadn't managed to stand back up yet.

Keith heard the question. Even over the pounding in his ears. And he'd had every intention of responding, he truly did. But before he had a chance to catch his breath, the tilt-a-whirl in his head spun out of control and he caved into the exhaustion eating at the periphery of his vision, darkening his awareness before his body could fall the last foot and a half to the floor.

But he wasn't out for long. To be fair, he hadn't even truly passed out. More like his body had decided to take a nap and, not having gotten the permission it was hoping for, had taken matters into its own hands.

He came to just as Shiro had finished removing his outer armor, apparently having carried Keith to his room.

It was all too familiar; this scene of his older brother attempting to take care of him like this. It had always been Shiro who nursed him back to health whenever he got sick growing up.

It was disgusting.

"I'm sorry." Keith finally spoke, as soon as he found himself in the proper place and time. Which was more difficult than one might assume, considering just how much his current reality sounded like something from a fever dream. Space mecha made of robot lions and all.

"For what?" Shiro asked, voice more tired and wary than curious. Keith couldn't tell if Shiro actually wanted Keith's answer or if he was just placating him.

"For all of this." He spoke, anyway. "I should never have come. The universe shouldn't be held responsible for my faults." It was the truth. As hard as it was for Keith to voice it aloud, it was still the truth.

Shiro was expecting this answer, apparently, as he just sighed; shaking his head, squaring his shoulders, and sitting down beside Keith on his bunk.

"Now, I know my memory hasn't been the best since coming back, but you didn't exactly have a choice, from what I can tell. I'm pretty sure it was Lance who climbed into the blue lion's mouth." Shiro took a deep breath in and continued on before Keith could retort; the slight humor in his voice replaced by the weary solemness of someone tired of repeating themselves. "And your condition was never your fault. We've been through this. None of it has ever been your fault. I know it's easier to deal with when you have someone to blame. But sometimes, there just isn't anyone to blame. Things just happen, and it sucks."

Keith didn't have a response to that. Who ever could? They had been through this argument before, to no avail. And it always stopped there, as neither of them had found a way to word how they felt.

In the silence, Keith's attention was drawn to the faint rattling beginning to build up in his breaths. He could feel it more than hear it, so he was pretty sure it had escaped his older brother's attention for now. But of course. As soon as he was aware of the sensation, Keith's body suddenly felt the overwhelming need to cough.

It was short, and more just a clearing of his throat than anything else. After a shiver raced up Keith's spine once the coughing had subsided, however, Shiro seemed to think it was a bad sign.

So it wasn't long before Keith was being scanned by a biometric sensor thing that was supposed to take his vitals. Shiro stared at its screen a little longer than he otherwise would have, if he hadn't been trying to translate the readings into something useful.

To no one's surprise, Keith had a low-grade, slowly building fever. Just what they all needed to hear.

Shiro used his helmet intercom to call Coran into the room to have a look at Keith. Much to Keith's chagrin.

Turns out, things like colds were universal and that's just what this was. A space cold. Only manifesting with a fever due to Keith's body already being compromised.

Unfortunately, it seemed like there not being a cure for the common cold was also universal, so Keith would just have to wait it out over the next few days.

Both Shiro and Keith thanked Coran for his time as he was heading out the door with instructions for Keith to drink lots of fluids and have lots of rest. Keith nodded dutifully, with every intention of sneaking out of his room as soon as Shiro and Coran were gone.

Shiro, however, was apparently not done talking to Keith. Once the door was shut behind the Altean, Shiro leveled Keith with a thousand-ton stare; finally choosing to break the silence that was years in the making.

"You know neither Mom nor Dad blamed you, right?" Shiro finally said, his voice just barely above a whisper; eyes boring holes into a spot in the middle of Keith's forehead.

Oh. They were back to this. They had each taken their turn trying to broach the subject of their parents in the past with little success. Too few answers and too many emotions. But Keith wasn't feeling up to deflecting and dodging Shiro's comments today.

"That's not what it looked like to me." Keith heard himself say. Already tired of both the turn in conversation topic and the confines his bed provided.

The words were out before Keith had even thought them. But that didn't stop them from being true.

"Mom left because she blamed Dad. And, I know I didn't talk to him much between Mom and the Garrison, but he never blamed you. He blamed himself." Shiro spoke. The weight of his words wearing his voice thin and hushed, as if his words were some secret gospel, hidden from the masses for millennia.

Keith responded with about the same amount of reverence as he felt appropriate for such a revelation. Which was none.

"Really?" It wasn't his fault his sarcasm was so thick. He hadn't meant for it to come out quite that honest.

"Really." Shiro said, his look so solemn and serious, Keith began to question his brother's ability to pick up on sarcasm at all. Maybe he was sarcasm-blind.

"Look. You lived with mom. I may not remember too much of what it was like to live with her, but I do remember her. I remember hearing the arguments she had with dad. I remember what it was like, not ever being capable of living up to her standards." Keith spat out, his anger at her suddenly rearing its ugly head for the first time in years.

He thought he was over this. He thought he had long since gotten over his futile hatred of their mother. It's not like he could blame her for being angry at him, he was fully aware of just how much of a screw up he was.

Their mom was ever mean to his face. On the contrary, you would have thought he was her second favorite thing in existence. It's not like there was ever a competition for first place. Who could ever win against THE Takashi Shirogane? Ace student, star pilot, beloved friend to all. The only one of the two of them to take her last name when she and their dad separated. Following exactly in her footsteps, promising to be the one person on earth who could beat her at her own game. Perfectly balanced in both physical might and innate intelligence, Shiro had always been destined to be a hero. A leader.

But not Keith.

No. He was just the accidental second child she hadn't expected.

Yet she had treated him with love, despite how much he had failed her. For the first three years of his life, before the diagnosis, she had been the warmest, most loving mother on the face of the planet, only showing the slightest disappointment when he didn't match up to when Shiro was his age. Even after the diagnosis, she was always warm and kind. But there was never any hiding the withdrawn sadness she regarded him in. As if he had somehow betrayed her trust just by existing.

Then, when he was five and Shiro was twelve, things had finally come to a head. Keith could still remember the sound of the fight had broken the camel's back, ending his parent's relationship once and for all.

And like most fights they'd had, this one was about Keith. Or, well, Keith's Dysmorthemia in any case.

Shiro had been at a sleepover, and their dad had just finished putting Keith to bed. He hadn't meant to intrude on his parent's private time. He had just realized he was thirsty about five minutes after his dad had gone back downstairs and had decided to get the water for himself instead of bothering either of his parents.

He hadn't seen the fight. Just heard his mother, angry and in tears, yelling at his father.

"You mean to tell me that you KNEW! You knew the condition ran in your family and you were still selfish enough to have not one but two kids?!" She had stage whispered, her voice wet and venomous.

"Oh come on, hun. How was I supposed to know I had the gene? It's so rare, I didn't think it would be a problem! I wasn't going to let something that had such a small chance of happening to dictate my or your happiness!"

"Oh don't 'hun' me you son-of-a-bitch! I am no longer your 'hun'! Your selfishness has given your son a life sentence! I don't want any part of it!"

And with that, the light to their bedroom had been turned off and Keith had barely had time to run into the kitchen and hide behind the counter as his mom stormed out of the room.

When Shiro had come home from his sleepover, their mom had taken him to a hotel, and that was the last time he had lived with either his mom or his brother, unless you counted the bi-monthly weekends Shiro spent with him and dad.

And no amount of comforting from Shiro would convince Keith that it wasn't his fault. Shiro hadn't been there that night to see what it was that had torn their family apart. Not that anyone present had ever told him what happened. If Keith had just not been born, or had been born healthy like what statistically should have happened, then they would have stayed that big happy family.

But no. Keith had to be the screw-up.

And his dad, as much as he tried to raise Keith as best he could, had known it too.

Which, as far as Keith was concerned, was only fair; seeing as the man had been forced to look at the proof of his failings as a husband and father every day. All the while constantly having to wonder if each day was going to be the day his mistake came to fruition and Keith started dying on him.

That was probably why he'd avoided being home whenever possible. Constantly taking on extra shifts Keith knew he didn't need to take, always coming or going whenever Keith was around. A shout on his way out the door about food in the fridge in the afternoons when Keith got home from school and a few more empty beer bottles added to the recycling when Keith woke up each morning.

"Woah there, buddy." Shiro's voice; not his voice as the kid or teenager from Keith's memories, but his adult voice; pulled him out of his too-real-for-comfort reverie. Somehow during his mental wanderings, he had wound up with his head in Shiro's lap, tears running sideways down his face.

"Hey, you know what, none of that matters right now. Because you are here with me and the rest of your Voltron family. And we love you and want you feeling better." Shiro said, shifting his body weight so that Keith got the hint and sat up.

Man, he was tired. And if the hollowed out circles under Shiro's eyes was anything to go by, he was almost as tired as Keith felt. As his head began to throb from the sudden change in position, Keith leaned back against the wall, expecting Shiro to finally up and leave. But instead of scooting away, Shiro gently pushed him down in the other direction, so that his head was on his pillow, and he was actually laying right-way-round in his bunk.

"...Shut up. I'm sick." Keith said, embarrassment adding to the flush on his cheeks as he turned his head toward the wall in an attempt to hide from Shiro's gaze.

Shiro chuckled anyway. "No worries, bro. Sleep well, and feel better in the morning. Love ya."

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever." Keith mumbled, pulling up his covers as the unnaturally cool air began to settle in around him, before he drifted off into a weird sleep full of yelling yet kindhearted women, (sometimes his mom yelling at his dad and sometimes Allura urging them on too hard in their training), and comforting brotherly faces (sometimes Shiro's from when they were younger, sometimes Shiro as an adult, and sometimes the other paladins. Each face bursting with pride and respect for him.).


End file.
